One flew over the cuckoos nest book

"One flew over the cuckoo's nest" written by Ken Kesey, is an excellent choice of a book for teens and adults alike. The book presents complex themes and ideas to do with mental illness, freedom, power, hierarchy, and rules and regulations.

One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest is one of those books that I think everyone's at least heard of – if not read themselves. It's a familiar story, with both substantial literary themes and characters that have transcended the confines of the novel. It's both a difficult read and an easy story to follow.

Flying over the cuckoo's nest is probably a way of expressing that someone is crazy (think back to elementary school when you'd call people "cuckoo" as an insult). The character who goes crazy in the end of the book isn't the narrator, Chief—by the closing of the novel he's remarkably sane.

Bromden's tale focuses mainly on the antics of the rebellious Randle Patrick McMurphy, who faked insanity to serve his sentence for battery and gambling in the hospital rather than at a prison work farm. The head administrative nurse, Nurse Ratched, rules the ward with absolute authority and little medical oversight.