Amazon Review

The roots of alcoholism in the life of a brilliant daughter of an upper-class family are explored in this stylistic, literary memoir of drinking by a Massachusetts journalist. Caroline Knapp describes how the distorted world of her well-to-do parents pushed her toward anexoria and then alcoholism. Fittingly, it was literature that saved her: She found inspiration in Pete Hamill’s A Drinking Life and sobered up. Her tale is spiced with the characters she’s known along the way.

Amazon Customer Review

As much as I loved this book, I doubt it will impress people who aren’t alcoholic or dealing with an alcoholic. Had I read this book in college, I would probably have sympathized with her problems but ultimately thought she was simply flaky and needed to just stop doing the stupid things she describes – not that complicated.

As it is, I read this book when I had become fully aware that my own relationship with alcohol had ceased to be simply “great when it’s around – like a good meal” and begun to be compulsive. The absence of a drink became an 800 pound elephant in the room, and I noticed that at some point I had stopped enjoying being sober. For me, that was when I realized I had crossed a line and that drinking was no longer cute or funny. Somewhere along the way, it had managed to insinuate itself as the center of my life, even though I never would have admitted it out loud. My first thought when invited to a social event was whether alcohol would be served. My first thought when going out to a meal in the evening was whether they had a liquor license. I had mentally divided my friends into drinkers and non-drinkers, and I had managed to do so without believing there was anything weird about this.

That is the subtle tug of alcoholism that Ms. Knapp exposes. To everyone around the alcoholic, it is obvious that there is a problem. To the alcoholic, he simply wants to suck the marrow out of life, and can’t understand why people aren’t with him. Yet, if pressed, most alcoholics will admit that their life stopped being happy right around the time they started drinking regularly (it is a depressant, after all. This shouldn’t be surprising). They will have what Ms. Knapp describes as that “a-ha” moment when alcoholics consider the possibility – obvious to everyone else but new and original to them – that they do not drink because they are unhappy. They are unhappy because they drink.

Ms. Knapp’s book is ideal, and potentially life-saving, for the intelligent, highly-functioning alcoholic who has not yet done anything so stupid that they are forced to recognize what everyone else in their life probably knows. This book could be the catalyst that allows them to head their problems off at the pass, because alcoholism ONLY gets worse. There’s a well-known speech about alcoholics in AA that includes a memorable phrase about what it feels like to be alcoholic – “the worst part is, people will never know how hard we tried”. Many an alcoholic can identify with this – no matter how many times alcohol has kicked you, it is the hardest thing you’ll ever do in your life to quit. Trust me on this and respect the next recovered alcoholic you meet. Had they had a choice, they would rather have walked across the Sahara. But they took a deep breath and tried to do the right thing for themselves and others.

Like so many reviewers of this book, I regret that the author died before I could personally thank her for the insights this book provides. However, she is in my prayers, and I hope she’s enjoying a very sober, happy existence with the same Higher Power that watched out for her here on earth.