It would be really easy to simply gloss over the pivotal, seeping role of alcoholism in this book, being as it is, a truly gripping murder story. And yet, the psychological terror of the book is informed by the dual psychosis of its main characters, one of whom is a young man, an alcoholic who seems intent on destroying his organs as quickly as possible. Bruno’s complete lack of contact with reality makes his alcoholism seemingly beside the point, but as the story progresses, I find my sympathies shifting as Bruno becomes more and more helplessly imprisoned by his disease.
- Memoir, criticism, and cultural history meet in this masterful study of the brilliant Black women who shaped American pop music, enriched by the author’s own experiences and memories.
- As a teenager, Darnell Moore was targeted by a group of local boys who, blinded by hate, tried to set him alight—a harrowing encounter that became the spark for a courageous life spent in pursuit of justice.
- If you’re looking for more sobriety resources, check out Monument’s therapist-moderated alcohol support groups and anonymous online forum.
- A New York lawyer, Lisa F. Smith, spirals downward while her friends reach new heights in their careers, life, and relationships.
Ditlevsen’s trilogy, by contrast, plunges us into the perspective of a succession of her former selves. When she’s a child, we’re presented with the world as a child might see it. When she’s hooked on Demetrol, we perceive events through the distorted viewpoint of an addict. This is the kind of myopic or unreliable narrator we encounter frequently in novels – conspicuously naïve or self-delusive, and unchaperoned by a consolingly wise authorial presence—but almost never in memoir.
In Pharoah’s Army: Memories of the Lost War by Tobias Wolff
With the actor’s encouragement, Stern also recorded hundreds of hours worth of interviews with his friends, family, and colleagues. The whole enterprise was destined to become Newman’s authorized biography, but his feelings on the project soured; in 1998, he gathered the tapes in a pile and set fire to them. Now, those transcripts have been streamlined into this honest and unvarnished memoir, in which the actor speaks openly about his traumatic childhood, his lifelong struggle with alcoholism, and his tormenting self-doubt. This is a lesser known series of essays on the intersection of alcohol and womanhood. The author, Kristi Coulter, engages the reader with her deep insight and quick wit.
Her story is a beautiful reminder of how safety and support can lead the way to incredible healing. Her upbringing was chaotic, with dysfunctional parents — an alcoholic father and a stubborn mother. The family bounced from home to home, state to state, while Jeanette and her siblings ran wild without the reins of concerned guardians. The Glass Castle is simultaneously beautiful and infuriating, and one of the more well-known and most influential memoirs of the last few decades. It’s not a biography — the story of a person’s life told by someone else — or an autobiography — a person telling their own life story. A memoir is the story of a specific time or theme or experience of a person’s life.
The Unexpected Joy of Being Sober by Catherine Gray
It includes recipes for zero-proof cocktails for all seasons and has tips for navigating the dating scene while completely sober. If you’re feeling down about “missing best alcoholic memoirs out” on life if you cut back on alcohol or got sober, read this book. Ward and Libaire show you how to get intoxicated, but with life instead of alcohol.
- It’s raw; it’s honest, and it’s a beautiful story of redemption and recovery.
- This book provides an amazing framework for embracing our true selves in a society that tries to tell us we’re not already whole as we are.
- Alcohol Explained is a spectacularly helpful guide on alcohol and alcoholism.
Unexplained men and bruises the next morning are only a few of the unremembered experiences Sarah Hepola recalls in this honest, raw, poignant memoir. Finding that her creativity didn’t come from a bottle, she gets sober and finds a life she didn’t know she wanted. It was the beginning of using externals to fix an internal problem. A 74-year old Native American found me at ten months in recovery. He showed me a path to follow, including opening a house of healing for other women.
A Piece of Cake: A Memoir by Cupcake Brown
In an era of opioid addiction, wellness obsession and internet oversharing, stories of substance abuse are back.
Blackout by Sarah Hepola is a brutally honest quit lit memoir of living through blackout after blackout—something that many who’ve struggled with heavy alcohol use can relate to. In this tale, author Catherine Gray describes the surprising joys you can experience when you ditch drinking. She covers why alcohol is so detrimental to a person’s well-being, and how your life and health can blossom without it. Beyond being informative, this powerful book has helped countless people dive deeper into their relationship with alcohol and make positive changes in their lives. When 15-year-old Cat moves to a new town in rural Michigan, she’s ecstatic to find a friend in Marlena, a beautiful, pill-popping neighbor. She’s drawn to Marlena’s world and joins her on an adventure of drinking, smoking, and kissing.
Girl Walks Out of a Bar: A Memoir
Fusing memoir, reportage, and travelogue, Perry imparts Southern history alongside high-spirited interviews with modern-day Southerners from all walks of life. At once a love letter to “a land of big dreams and bigger lies” and a clarion call for change, South to America will change how you understand America’s past, present, and future. Cultural criticism, memoir, and social history collide in Aronowitz’s no-nonsense investigation of all that ails young lovers, like questions about desire, consent, and patriarchy. A stunning debut novel about a short but intense friendship between two girls that ends in tragedy, Marlena pinpoints both what it feels like to be the addict and what it’s like to be the friend of one. Often, when we think of books about addiction and specifically alcoholism (in my case), we think of important, tell-all works of nonfiction.
Amid a public outcry, McDougall suggests, Williams resorted to taking amphetamine pills and Valium, “prescribed by Wilson’s doctor”, which contributed to the “hysterical outbursts” for which she became known. Further scandal followed in 1976, when it was revealed that Williams had hand-written Wilson’s controversial resignation honours list (dubbed the “Lavender List”) on a sheet of lilac paper. McDougall’s sympathetic book is a “gripping” portrait both of an “extraordinary woman”, and of the “emotional dynamics of Downing Street”. The revelations in this addiction memoir may not seem unique, but the fact that the seasoned journalist deployed his reporting skills to interrogate untrusted memories makes it a landmark in the genre.
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