Senior Contributor Amy Liz Harrison came for the Aqua Net nostalgia and stayed for the uncomfortable recognition. Her review of Christie Brinkley’s “Uptown Girl” explores what happens when a celebrity memoir holds up a mirror to the people we loved while we were drinking.

From Wham! fangirling to sober reinvention, Senior Contributor Amy Liz Harrison finds plenty to love in Janey Lee Grace’s memoir. This four-sobees review explores music, midlife and the many versions of ourselves we bring along for the ride.

Senior Contributor Tony Harte reviews John Callahan’s fiercely irreverent memoir, Don’t Worry, He Won’t Get Far on Foot. Callahan’s story dismantles the idea that one devastating consequence automatically produces sobriety—or that recovery turns every complicated person into an inspirational hero.

Senior Contributor Tony Harte reviews Euphoric Recall, Aidan Martin’s unflinching memoir about growing up in Scotland, surviving trauma and finding recovery from addiction. The book challenges the selective memories that can make past substance use appear safer and more appealing than it really was.

Megan A. Schikora’s A Woman in Pink examines what happens when love, loyalty and the desire to save someone begin to look dangerously like self-abandonment.

Laura Clery’s What Doesn’t Kill You Makes You Hotter is a funny, vulnerable and occasionally uncomfortable account of divorce, single motherhood, dating and staying sober when life refuses to follow the script.

Nearly 30 years after hearing Anthony Hopkins speak at a Los Angeles recovery meeting, Senior Contributor Lane Kennedy revisits that experience through his memoir, We Did OK, Kid. As Hopkins celebrates 50 years sober, Lane reflects on why getting sober is only the beginning—and what it really means to stay.

Senior Contributor Tony Harte reviews The Acts of Kenny Lambert by Kurt Rasmussen, an introspective novel about alcoholism, identity and one man’s uneasy entrance into recovery. Despite uneven pacing and an unresolved spiritual conflict, its final act delivers a compelling portrait of self-deception and change.

That book in your head isn’t writing itself. Tawny Lara’s fall writing room runs Tuesdays and Thursdays, September 22 through November 19, with guided prompts, focused writing time, and a community of writers who get it.

After Hayden Panettiere’s death at 36, Contributor Carolyn Bunn returned to “This Is Me: A Reckoning” with a different perspective. As a woman in long-term sobriety who has also chosen not to have children, she reflects on addiction, postpartum depression, motherhood, identity and the complicated gaps we sometimes leave in our own stories.

Simon Dyson threw Ironman medals in a shoebox, drank to fix what could not be fixed, and got sober after a stranger prayed for him at Notre Dame. Then he rode 852 kilometers across the Karoo and came home with a farm to build for his son Billy.

Aerosmith accidentally invented recovery coaching in the 1980s. Forty years later, coach Stephanie Hazard wrote the first mainstream book about it. Our #QUITLIT review of Making Sobriety Stick, including the Sobees score and the one chapter written for readers with decades of sobriety.

Evan Cason’s memoir, *Beyond the Street Lamp*, offers a sincere look at the journey from gang life to sobriety. In her review, Patti Clark highlights the book’s heartfelt nature while also noting its structural challenges. Cason’s story is a poignant reminder of the power of vulnerability and honesty in the recovery journey.

Getting sober can mean rebuilding your social life from the ground up. Anne Marie Cribbin explores the rise of “third places” — coffee shops, run clubs, bookstores, gardens and other community spaces — and why belonging, not alcohol, may be what we were searching for all along.

Three memoirs came out this year from three people who could not be more different, and every one of them was writing about the same thing. We pulled the Sober Curator readers into a room and made them score it.

Author Austin Rampt joins Bill and Mike on Sober Not Mature for a raw, funny and deeply honest conversation about addiction, multiple overdoses, life in Mexico, recovery and his memoir, *One Last Hit*. His story is proof that even after years of chaos, a completely different life is possible.

In Drunk Daddy, Trixie Rose tells the story of growing up with an alcoholic father and the emotional survival strategies that followed her into adulthood. Amy Liz Harrison reviews this short, funny and quietly devastating addition to the Bad Memoir series.

In Stripped Down: Unfiltered and Unapologetic, Bunnie Xo shares her journey through childhood trauma, sex work, meth addiction and survival—and the choices that helped her build a new life in sobriety. Sober Curator Contributor Carolyn Bunn reviews this candid memoir about recovery, resilience and proving that your past does not get to write your final chapter.

Senior Sober Curator Contributor Tony Harte reviews Jason Mayo’s In Case of Emergency, Break Childhood, a brutally honest, darkly funny and deeply relatable memoir about childhood trauma, addiction, relationships and the slow loss of control. More than a retelling of one man’s downward spiral, the book invites readers inside the thoughts and emotions behind it.

Somehow it took me years to find The Small Bow, A.J. Daulerio’s recovery newsletter, podcast, and daily meeting community. Or its crossover column with Oldster Magazine, “Ask a Sober Oldster,” now 35 installments deep. Consider this your formal introduction.

The original printer’s copy of Alcoholics Anonymous just sold at Christie’s for an estimated one to two million dollars. The Stepping Stones Foundation, the National Historic Landmark home of Bill and Lois Wilson in Katonah, New York, won the bid. It is going back to exactly where it belongs.

Senior Sober Curator Patti Clark reviews The Bright Years by Sarah Damoff through the lens of an Adult Child of an Alcoholic. This moving debut novel explores alcoholism, abandonment, intergenerational trauma, family survival, and the complicated work of healing without offering easy shortcuts. Heartbreaking, compassionate, and deeply resonant, The Bright Years is highly recommended for readers who understand the long shadow addiction can cast across a family.

I listened to the audiobook on Audible, in Austin’s own voice, while I was packing up my house and cleaning out decades of accumulated life. Austin Rampt’s One Last Hit is eight rehab programs, a decade of active addiction, and one of the more honest addiction memoirs you will find. 3.5 out of 5 Sobees.

If you know what the Big Book is to you, you already felt something when you read that it is going to auction at Christie’s on July 1. The original 167-page working manuscript, with Bill Wilson’s handwriting in the margins, is estimated at $1 to $2 million. The Irsay family is selling it last. Intentionally.

Daisy Jones & the Six isn’t told like most novels. Taylor Jenkins Reid structures the story as an oral history,…

This guide highlights essential sober books for readers exploring alcohol-free living, recovery, habit change, and healthier routines. From Quit Like a Woman and This Naked Mind to Atomic Habits, The Mountain Is You, and Dry, the article offers a practical reading list for anyone looking to better understand drinking culture, emotional patterns, self-sabotage, and the daily habits that support sobriety.

Anna David’s Legacy Launch Pad Publishing is helping entrepreneurs, media personalities, and recovery voices turn their stories into books. Here are the Quit Lit and recovery titles from Legacy Launch Pad that belong on your sober bookshelf.

Author Anna David reflects on the evolution from her early “will-say-anything” sober party girl years to motherhood, trauma recovery, and a more grounded understanding of herself. In this personal essay, she shares why she re-released a cleaner version of Party Girl 15 years later — and what happens when the wildest version of your past is still searchable, sellable, and occasionally handed to you by your child’s school principal.

Rufi Thorpe came to BACKSTAGE. Here is the five-minute clip, the conversation that broke the room, and the answer I am still thinking about.

Our recent live Alcohol Free Life Podcast event with the brilliant Catherine Gray left me buzzing, and thinking, long after…