The Golden Straitjacket (Unabridged‪)‬

Madness and genius are often said to be close bedfellows, although the link between the two is little understood. Chris Joseph has known both extremes, and in The Golden Straitjacket, he lays bare his struggle with bipolar disorder and the condition's pendulum-like swing between creative dynamism and dark despair.

After walking out of university and briefly dabbling with life as a Benedictine monk and nightclub bouncer, Chris went to work at a dilapidated iron foundry where he lost his right arm in an horrific industrial accident. The accident was the springboard to a new career in the world of advertising - and the trigger for the mental illness that was to blight his life. Having established his own award-winning agency in London's West End - renowned for its off-the-wall creative thinking - Chris also used his considerable creative skills to publicize and settle High Court copyright and banking disputes with major corporations, most notably Barclays Bank.

The Golden Straitjacket is a graphic, moving, and frequently hilarious account of his life as a bipolar sufferer, the highs which drove the creation of multi-million pound advertising campaigns giving way to bouts of deep depression and enforced hospitalization. The 66 stories or "manicdotes" can be enjoyed together or in isolation - they tell the tale of an extraordinary man whose struggle to overcome physical and mental obstacles will be an inspiration to anyone facing the stigma of physical disability and mental illness.