Books.org participates in affiliate programs including Bookshop.org and the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program. We may earn a commission from qualifying purchases made through links on this page, at no additional cost to you.
Overview
Chicago Sun-Times columnist Neil Steinberg loved his job, his wife, and his two young sons. But he also loved to drink. Drunkard is an unflinchingly honest account of one man's descent into alcoholism and his ambivalent struggle to embrace sobriety. Sentenced to an outpatient rehab program, Steinberg discovers that twenty-eight days of therapy cannot reverse the toll taken by decades of hard drinking. As Steinberg claws his way through recovery, grieves the loss of the drink, and tries to shore up his faltering marriage, he is confronted by the greatest test he has ever faced, and finds himself in the process. Steinberg's gripping memoir is a frank and often painfully funny account of the stark-yet-common realities of a disease that affects millions.
Synopsis
Chicago Sun-Times columnist Neil Steinberg loved his job, his wife, and his two young sons. But he also loved to drink. Drunkard is an unflinchingly honest account of one man's descent into alcoholism and his ambivalent struggle to embrace sobriety. Sentenced to an outpatient rehab program, Steinberg discovers that twenty-eight days of therapy cannot reverse the toll taken by decades of hard drinking. As Steinberg claws his way through recovery, grieves the loss of the drink, and tries to shore up his faltering marriage, he is confronted by the greatest test he has ever faced, and finds himself in the process. Steinberg's gripping memoir is a frank and often painfully funny account of the stark-yet-common realities of a disease that affects millions.
Publishers Weekly
Steinberg, a columnist for the Chicago Sun-Times, admitted he was an alcoholic—only he'd rather be called a "drunkard," a more colorful "slur"—only after a judge sentenced him to rehab. He'd hit his wife in an argument over his drinking; by Steinberg's initial account, before his arrest, he was living the ideal newspaperman's life—a few Jack Daniels at his regular bar after filing his popular column, a few red wines in the bar car of the commuter train to the suburbs, then a cozy evening with his loving wife and two sons. It's only after he's in rehab that he recalls all the other drinks he'd sneak when his wife or his kids weren't looking. He had no choice about going to rehab for 28 days, but couldn't see the use of going to AA meetings. An agnostic iconoclast, the higher-power language and the instant fellowship-of-drunks aspect of AA made him uncomfortable. Through his relapses and his recoveries, Steinberg developed his own relationship with AA and learned how to be a hot newspaperman without a shot glass on his desk. Steinberg's struggle to be honest with himself will touch a nerve with many readers. (June)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.Editorials
From Barnes & Noble
Barnes & Noble Discover Great New Writers" 'Alcoholic' is so clinical," writes Chicago Sun-Times columnist Steinberg, "If your life is going to be wedded to a slur, it might as well be a colorful one." And so explains the title of this surprising memoir, a retelling of Steinberg's battle with alcoholism and his attempts to give up drinking for good.
To those looking in from the outside, Steinberg has a great life. Happily married and the father of two young boys, he has a satisfying job and an enthusiastic following of readers. But when his formerly innocent habit of downing a few drinks on the way home from work morphs into something much more dangerous, Steinberg ends up in jail, with little choice but sobriety.
Yet Steinberg's imagination fails him as he struggles to picture a life without alcohol. As a writer, he revels in the stereotype of the hard-drinking newspaperman and embraces alcohol as an essential component of his identity. The drink his favorite bartender instantly prepares for him as he walks through the door is his "Pulitzer," his "round of applause from the world." Facing a temperate future, he despairs that his sons will never see him "as the sophisticated dad swirling the wine in his glass and casting off confidence like a glow." In this no-holds-barred dissection of its subject's flaws, Drunkard is a laudably honest and completely original read. (Fall 2008 Selection)
Publishers Weekly
Steinberg, a columnist for the Chicago Sun-Times, admitted he was an alcoholic—only he'd rather be called a "drunkard," a more colorful "slur"—only after a judge sentenced him to rehab. He'd hit his wife in an argument over his drinking; by Steinberg's initial account, before his arrest, he was living the ideal newspaperman's life—a few Jack Daniels at his regular bar after filing his popular column, a few red wines in the bar car of the commuter train to the suburbs, then a cozy evening with his loving wife and two sons. It's only after he's in rehab that he recalls all the other drinks he'd sneak when his wife or his kids weren't looking. He had no choice about going to rehab for 28 days, but couldn't see the use of going to AA meetings. An agnostic iconoclast, the higher-power language and the instant fellowship-of-drunks aspect of AA made him uncomfortable. Through his relapses and his recoveries, Steinberg developed his own relationship with AA and learned how to be a hot newspaperman without a shot glass on his desk. Steinberg's struggle to be honest with himself will touch a nerve with many readers. (June)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.