Dry: A Memoir
by Augusten Burroughs
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Book Summary Information
Author: Augusten BurroughsEdition: Paperback
Audio: English (Original Language); English (Unknown); English (Published)
Published: 2004-04-01
ISBN: 0312423799
Number of pages: 320
Publisher: Picador
Book Reviews of Dry: A Memoir
Book Review: A good read, puts a humorous spin on a dark subject
Summary: 5 Stars
I got this on kindle for my phone and found it searching for sarcastic authors such as Vonnegut or Christopher Moore. The writing is often funny, especially considering the rather dark subject matter of extreme addiction. It is at a point of my own life where myself and my partner are looking at our own alcohol abuse, and trying to make some adjustments in our lives so as not to go overboard ourselves. Reading this really shows how low a person can go. His description of his apartment filled with gin bottles really hit a nerve for me when I consider the recent past where I had a similar collection of beer bottles. It was an entertaining story that I read through rather quickly without ever getting bored. The ending came up rather suddenly I thought but it was well paced beginning to end. I did not yet read Running with Scissors, and thought perhaps I should have done that first considering some other reviews, but this book stands on its own and was an appropriate find for me at this point in my life. I very much enjoyed it.
Summary of Dry: A Memoir
From the bestselling author of Running with Scissors comes Dry-the hilarious, moving, and no less bizarre account of what happened next.You may not know it, but you've met Augusten Burroughs. You've seen him on the street, in bars, on the subway, at restaurants: a twenty-something guy, nice suit, works in advertising. Regular. Ordinary. But when the ordinary person had to drinks, Augusten was circling the drain by having twelve; when the ordinary person went home at midnight, Augusten never went home at all. Loud, distracting ties, automated wake-up calls, and cologne on the tongue could only hide so much for so long. At the request (well, it wasn't really a request) of his employers, Augusten landed in rehab, where his dreams of group therapy with Robert Downey, Jr., are immediately dashed by the grim reality of fluorescent lighting and paper hospital slippers. But when Augusten is forced to examine himself, something actually starts to click, and that's when he finds himself in the worst trouble of all. Because when his thirty days are up, he has to return to his same drunken Manhattan life-and live it sober. What follows is a memoir that's as moving as it is funny, as heartbreaking as it is real. Dry is the story of love, loss, and Starbucks as a higher power.
Fans of Augusten Burroughs's darkly funny memoir Running with Scissors were left wondering at the end of that book what would become of young Augusten after his squalid and fascinating childhood ended. In Dry, we find that although adult Augusten is doing well professionally, earning a handsome living as an ad writer for a top New York agency, Burroughs's personal life is a disaster. His apartment is a sea of empty Dewar's bottles, he stays out all night boozing, and he dabs cologne on his tongue in an unsuccessful attempt to mask the stench of alcohol on his breath at work. When his employer insists he seek help, Burroughs ships out to Minnesota for detoxification, counseling, and amusingly told anecdotes about the use of stuffed animals in group therapy. But after a month of such treatment, he's back in Manhattan and tenuously sober. And while its one thing to lay off the sauce in rehab, Burroughs learns that it's quite another to resume your former life while avoiding the alcohol that your former life was based around. This quest to remain sober is made dramatically more difficult, and the tale more harrowing, when Burroughs begins an ill-advised romance with a crack addict. Certainly the "recovered alcoholic fighting to stay sober" tale is not new territory for a memoirist. But Burroughs's account transcends clich?s: it doesn't adhere to the traditional "temptation narrowly resisted" storyline and it features, in Burroughs himself, a central character that is sympathetic even when he's neither likable nor admirable. But what ultimately makes this memoir such a terrific read is a brilliant and candid sense of humor that manages to stay dry even when recalling events where the author was anything but. --John Moe
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