LadyBlue0527

A favorite pastime of mine is reading. I can get lost in a good book. I'm sure that I'm just more cognizant of it now but I never realized how intertwined alcohol is in fiction. Additionally, romanticized, and used to soak up all of life's problems. It doesn't detract from the story line but cheese whiz, in the current book I'm reading, which is a mystery, every chapter has had the use of alcohol. No wonder there are so many issues with alcohol. The underlying message we are given is that every problem can be solved with a good stiff drink.

ippochick

i read 'the haunting of hill house' recently and they were having a drink about every 5 minutes!

KateL

They should make books like old films, where a nice cup of tea cures everything

doggonecarl

Not all fiction romanizes drinking and alcohol. I wrote the following when I first came to SR after noticing that some books have treated alcohol like the problem it was:

http://www.soberrecovery.com/forums/...song-lark.html

jdooner

Truth has always been stranger than fiction. I find alcohol woven so deeply into our society (not parts of Asia though) that it would seem off if a story did not include it. Many writers are alcoholics, recovered and functional. You write what you know.

Is the book good?

I like John Sandford for fiction.

Threshold

My BF and I noticed watching Downton Abbey how MUCH and constantly they drink...wine with every meal, followed by scotch and brandy...yikes.

I haven't noticed it as much in books..but it probably has to do with genre...BUT, I've read a number of books the past few years by Irish authors and HOLY CATS....everyone gets plastered constantly, it's the expected thing.

Marian Keyes though, also Irish has written a number of novels and in most of them there is a woman with an addiction, alcoholism, but she is clear about the toll it takes and in some of them the women are in recovery or the family is trying to get them into recovery. I have found those books thought inspiring as I recover myself.

LadyBlue0527

The name of it is Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn. Pretty tangled web and took a little perseverance to get lost in it. I'm like that with books I'll just keep going waiting for the point where I'm there. Interesting that most writers are either alcoholics or recovering. It just so happens too that one of the main characters in this book who drinks a lot is a writer.

bi11fish

I never noticed how much alcohol was part of society in general until I stopped drinking and started adding resentments to my already huge list.
I really was one of those crazy people who thought if I could not drink then no one should be able to drink. I still believed the I was the center of the universe and everything was about me. The fact is that people can drink successfully I just happen to be one who cannot. When I stopped looking for alcohol I stopped seeing it everywhere.

fini

I'm sure that I'm just more cognizant of it now but I never realized how intertwined alcohol is in fiction.

LadyBlue,
yeah, i noticed that too.
when i first quit drinking, i joined a bookclub at my local library for the first time in my life; figured it would be good to join some others instead of continuing with the evenings-home-alone routine, and i'd end up reading some books i wouldn't ordinarily choose.
it was a fantastic experience, one of the best short-term groups i've ever been in.
there was a book from the fifties, and i was so taken aback by the never-ending cocktails everyone drank so routinely and which were so much anticipated and needed, it seemed.
i'd read this particular book years before, when i was still drinking, and never noticed. nothing seemed unusual to me about it then.
when i mentioned in the group that there was an incredible amount of drinking going on in the fiction, the responses were "huh?" "they're just having a few drinks now and then..." "waddaya mean? there isn't any drinking in that story...."
different perception entirely.

LadyBlue0527

You know once, just once I would like to make an observation without someone having to look deeper at the reason for it. Good for you that you figured out that thinking about people drinking is a resentment for YOU. I, myself, am 100% secure in MY sobriety and the fact that I don't drink. Just because I make an observation about something does not imply that I wish to do the same.

If I have resentment it's because I can't make a solid and valid statement oh thus board without some return implication that it means any more that I meant it to mean.

Sometimes it just is what it is, THIS is one of those times.

For the love of sobriety......

LadyBlue0527

I apologize to everyone as you will rarely see me make a statement like I did. I'm just tired of the passive aggressive preaching.

KateL

Yes, I know you were just making an observation and nothing more. It is a good observation too. Really interesting. x

ippochick

marian keyes is a recovering alcoholic, which is how she writes about alcoholism with such truth. i love her books.

stephen king, also in recovery, writes uncomfortably well about addiction. i must admit, since my mental health troubles started, i have quite the library of books related to mental illness, and am now starting an alcoholism collection!

TomSawyer

I have an entire bookshelf of alcoholic-themed books, accumulated before I began recovery. I always romanticized alcohol in literature, but I think there's something more to it: I don't just like those books for their stories, but I identified so much with the authors because I was an alcoholic just like them, my thinking, my sensitivity, my depressed-outlook on life was so in tune with theirs. Hemingway, Jack Kerouac (Big Sur is perhaps the definitive account of alcoholism), Jack London, Under the Volcano, A Fan's Notes, etc.

Now, I'm beginning to acquire a bookshelf of recovery memoirs. The bookshelf sort of reads as a timeline of my life: alcoholism through recovery.

hokey

I was reading a book the other night and thinking that very same thought ... WOW they talk about booze a lot! And here I find a thread about that very thought! Thanks for the observation and discussion Ladyblue, I didn't think anyone else noticed, just me because it is such an issue right now. Good to know I'm not crazy! (well ... not too crazy )

Threshold

I had no idea Stephen King was in recovery. I haven't read anything of his in, um ...decades. Maybe I should give a look see...any recommendations?

Dee74

The latest book Dr Sleep is a sequel to The Shining, although I don't believe you need to read the earlier book.

Danny, the boy from The Shining, is now a man and an alcoholic in recovery.

His Kennedy book 11-22-63 was quite good too.

D

dwtbd

LB
Without trying to be passive aggressive argumentative, why do use the phrase " message we are given" ?

In the context of the OP , it seems to imply a concerted effort by various individuals, and that their combined works as they touch on alcohol is almost irresponsible. At least that is what I get from the 'feel' of your observation.

In some cases a good stiff drink does help alleviate ,if at least the immediacy , of a problem. Because I have been addicted to alcohol , this would never again be a 'good' option for me, but that doesn't mean it is never a good or not harmful option for certain people in certain situations.

foolsgold66

I'm a big reader too, but my passion is mostly science fiction, the emphasis doesn't jump out at me there. Certainly there is some alcohol and drug use even in some of them, with a few notable classic exceptions, they aren't seen as problem solvers, at least to me.

TomSawyer

He actually has claimed that he doesn't even remember writing "Cujo" due to his drug and alcohol abuse during that time of his life. Kinda fascinating.