A Wellness Check

There, in the night sky, projected over city smog and ghost stars-the Rat Signal. Followed by the rev of the Ratmobile's custom made engine and the inevitable slam of Asylum doors. Bri Gonzalez's debut collection, A Wellness Check, snatches a beloved caped crusader and spins him on his head. It follows a recently diagnosed speaker under the care of Dr. Ratman-part-time psychologist, part-time vigilante who ratarangs his patients into submission. Alongside characters like Mr. Double-Side, The Quippler, and Clown Princess, the speaker must untangle their relationship with Dr. Ratman and their disorder. Through an amalgamation of hybrid prose, poetry, screenplays, and fragment essays, A Wellness Check jabs at pop culture's use of mental illness as shock value. Here, the experience of diagnosis is laid bare. Here, the joys and pains of clinical illness are interwoven with rat fists, diner coffee, crossword puzzles, plot twists, divinity, and the looming shadows of heroes that want us dead, or worse.