Heroine

Heavy doesn't even begin to describe this book. There is a trigger warning at the start of this book and that ain't no joke! I'm not an addict (recovering or otherwise) but this book made me anxious as sin. I know an addict or two and this was so spot on to their behavior and justifications. Heroine follows Mickey Catalan, a high school softball star, as she tries to recover from a life changing injury that threatens to take away the one thing she really cares about, sports. She and her best friend were in a horrific car accident that popped Mickey's leg out of its socket, and the therapy and emotional toll its taking on her, is crippling. She soon starts relying on the Oxy she's prescribed to take the pain away so she can focus on physical therapy. Her only goal is getting healed before spring training so she can start on the varsity team her senior year. But she's not an addict, she's using a prescription from her doctor for the pain. She's not like those losers that overdose and live on the streets. The real question is, what will happen when she runs out of her pills? How badly does she need them to "recover?" A haunting story that shows just how easy it is for ANYONE to get addicted to opiates. It's a slippery slope fraught with good intentions, the end result is just so horrifying. A powerful book that will stay with the reader long after finishing. 

The Murder of Sonny Liston: Las Vegas, Heroin, and Heavyweights

Admittedly I knew next to nothing about Sonny Liston before I read this book. I'm not much of a sports guru, although I do love boxing movies. All I knew about Sonny Liston was that he was the fallen boxer in the famous photo with Muhammad Ali towering over him. That's it. While this book doesn't go into too much detail about Sonny's early life or early career, it does mention some key facts and picks up the story towards the end of Sonny's life and career. This book doesn't paint a pretty picture of anyone but it is a fascinating look at corruption, the mob, heroin, and Las Vegas. The author meticulously puts together all the possible events, people, and circumstances that point to the famous boxer being murdered, even though there was never a homicide investigation. The plot thickens when you realize that virtually no one was straight, not even his wife. While there is no concrete conclusion at the end, readers will draw their own conclusions and in the process learn a great deal about boxing, fight fixing, draft dodgers, heroin, dirty cops, and Las Vegas. Thoroughly engaging, I wish there had been more pictures, but hey, what is a little outside research on my own.

Tweak

Wow, this book took my breath away. It was terrifying, inspirational, insane, unbelievable, and heartbreaking. I've never had the urge to do hard drugs and this book firmly cemented my belief that drugs will fuck your shit up. 

I'm an anxious reader as it is and I always get nervous when a character does something I know they shouldn't do or that they'll get in trouble for later (you could say I get waaay too invested in my stories) and this book had me hyperventilating. I was practically yelling at the book, "Don't do it Nic! Don't relapse! That's a horrible idea! What are you thinking??"

This memoir is haunting and heartbreaking but you really have to admire the guts Nic has in sharing his brutal story about addiction. He spiraled out of control multiple times and he leaves nothing out. He was using dirty needles, prostituting himself, stealing from his family, doing every type of drug imaginable and he lays it all out for the reader. It took a lot of failed attempts but he finally got clean, testament to, no matter how bad your life is you can turn it around.

A truly great (but terrifying) book.

Clean: Overcoming Addiction and Ending America's Greatest Tragedy

This was definitely one of the hardest books I've read this year, not because it was badly written but because the subject matter was very personal and not at all comforting like I hoped it would be. I'm not going to go into details in this book review but those of you who know me, know why I find this subject hard. It's something that I never would have guessed would affect me or anyone I care about, but who am I kidding, this is the 21st century. Addiction is more prevalent then ever.

Prior to this book, I knew the concept behind addiction and thought I had it all figured out. Basically after reading this, I realized I know nothing on this subject. In my head, addicts were selfish people who didn't know when enough was enough and tore their family and friends lives to pieces in their selfish downward spiral. Clearly, I have a very old fashioned way of thinking, I had never once considered addiction a "real" disease.

Author, David Sheff, does a marvelous job of outlining addiction (why we use, the disease, drugs and alcohol in our culture, etc.), and ways to get addicts clean (he describes dozens of different treatments, not everyone can get clean the same way) and stay clean. David has a lot of experience dealing with addiction, his son Nic spent years addicted to hard drugs and later wrote the book, "Tweak." David Sheff outlines the struggles of dealing with addiction as a family in his first book, "Beautiful Boy" ("Clean" is his second novel).

Some interesting facts and tidbits that I took away from this book:

1. Comparing money spent on cancer and AIDS research as compared with addiction research = "the total spent on AIDS is $3 billion - or $3,000 per infected person. We spend $29 per addict." (page 290)

2. "In Vancouver, at a supervised injection site called, Insite, drug users are given not only clean needles but a safe place to shoot up and stay while they're high... A series of studies has shown that Insite is effective at getting addicts into treatment, lowering crime in the neighborhood, and reducing the number of overdoses and illnesses from drug use." (page 302)

3. In Portugal the government decriminalized the possession and use of all drugs - not only marijuana but heroin, cocaine, and the rest. Drugs are still illegal, but users caught with small quantities aren't sent to jail. Instead they face a panel consisting of a psychologist, social worker, and legal adviser who recommend appropriate treatment... A study found that five years after personal possession was decriminalized, illegal drug use among teens had declined, rates of new HIV infections had dropped and the number of people seeking treatment for drug addiction had more than doubled. Prior to the change in policy, Portugal had one of the highest rates of drug use in Europe, afterward, it had one of the lowest." (pages 303-304)

4. "A majority of patients who enter treatment never complete it. Among those who do, 40 to 86 percent relapse in the first year." (page 17)

5. "The stigma associated with drug use - the belief that bad kids use, good kids don't, and those with full blown addiction are weak, degenerate, and pathetic - has contributed to the escalation of use and has hampered treatment more than any single other factor."(page 25)

6. Addiction IS a disease. " A disease is "an interruption, cessation, or disorder of a body, system, or organ structure or function," according to "Stedman's Medical Dictionary. It's "a morbid entity ordinarily characterized by two or more of the following criteria: recognized etiologic agents, identifiable group of signs and symptoms, or consistent anatomic alterations." Addiction fits every one of these criteria." (page 89) Addicts aren't weak, selfish, or amoral - they're ill.

7. "Researchers have found that if a person makes it to two years [being sober], his likelihood of relapse diminishes dramatically, and after five years, most addicts will continue to stay sober." (page 266)

Sorry I got a little wordy on the statistics, but those are only just a handful of what you can discover in this book, I  learned soo much. I learned how complex addiction is and how hard it is to treat. This is an absolute MUST read, a real eye opener, and very present in our society as we reflect on the United States failed drug war.