Dry by Augusten Burroughs

From the author's website: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 two 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 lands in rehab, where his dreams of group therapy with Robert Downey, Jr., are immediately dashed by 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.

Fascinating book! Yes, it's about the drinking but it's more about the relationships. I loved his friends, Hayden and Pighead and his co-worker Greer, I loved the way that they loved Augusten. I didn't love Foster but he certainly was riveting. What fun to get a peek into the world of advertising! Working on a German beer campaign, they brainstormed a list of "all things German" and, of course, it included cuckoo clocks and lederhosen, but then it also included techno music and leather underwear - that's just funny. Thats the way of the book - life but funny, sad but funny, real (mostly) but funny. There were some flashbacks to childhood so the ick factor of Running With Scissors wasn't completely gone. And you know the inevitable is going to happen so a lot of the book just feels like you're waiting for it. But in the end, it's just amazing, when you consider the life he had led already - just in his teens and early 20's - that he survived it all to write his memoirs.

This book is my "D" for the A-Z Reading Challenge! Click on the logo to see my progress.






and this one too...
This is on my list for the Spring Reading Thing 2009. Click on the logo to see the rest of my list.