100 Books Like This Naked Mind

I vowed at a young age to never drink alcohol. I dove headfirst into psychology, earning a doctorate and I believed generational alcohol chains were broken. I became the "LA Shrink" and "Life Coach" on some pretty cool TV pilots! But life threw me a curveball, and after two decades of moderate, responsible drinking, I found myself addicted to alcohol. However, I cured it, and I've been passionately helping others do the same. I'm now a coach at WearetheAFR.org, an amazing nonprofit community dedicated to supporting individuals with alcohol addictions. My journey is filled with passion, resilience, and joy. I'm living proof that it's possible.

I vowed at a young age to never drink alcohol. I dove headfirst into psychology, earning a doctorate and I believed generational alcohol chains were broken. I became the "LA Shrink" and "Life Coach" on some pretty cool TV pilots! But life threw me a curveball, and after two decades of moderate, responsible drinking, I found myself addicted to alcohol. However, I cured it, and I've been passionately helping others do the same. I'm now a coach at WearetheAFR.org, an amazing nonprofit community dedicated to supporting individuals with alcohol addictions. My journey is filled with passion, resilience, and joy. I'm living proof that it's possible.

I vowed at a young age to never drink alcohol. I dove headfirst into psychology, earning a doctorate and I believed generational alcohol chains were broken. I became the "LA Shrink" and "Life Coach" on some pretty cool TV pilots! But life threw me a curveball, and after two decades of moderate, responsible drinking, I found myself addicted to alcohol. However, I cured it, and I've been passionately helping others do the same. I'm now a coach at WearetheAFR.org, an amazing nonprofit community dedicated to supporting individuals with alcohol addictions. My journey is filled with passion, resilience, and joy. I'm living proof that it's possible.

I vowed at a young age to never drink alcohol. I dove headfirst into psychology, earning a doctorate and I believed generational alcohol chains were broken. I became the "LA Shrink" and "Life Coach" on some pretty cool TV pilots! But life threw me a curveball, and after two decades of moderate, responsible drinking, I found myself addicted to alcohol. However, I cured it, and I've been passionately helping others do the same. I'm now a coach at WearetheAFR.org, an amazing nonprofit community dedicated to supporting individuals with alcohol addictions. My journey is filled with passion, resilience, and joy. I'm living proof that it's possible.

I am an anthropologist and cognitive scientist who studies some of the things that make us human—but not the obvious ones. I am mostly interested in those things that may appear puzzling or pointless, but fill our lives with meaning and purpose. Growing up in Greece, I read National Geographic Magazine and reveled in the documentaries of Jane Goodall, David Attenborough, and Jacques Cousteau, which sparked in me a passion for exploration through the combined lenses of personal experience and scientific scrutiny. In my own research, I have spent two decades studying ritual by conducting several years of ethnographic research and bringing scientific measurements into real-life settings.

I’m a social and cultural historian of North America and Latin America, specializing in the history of alcohol, food, and identity. When I’m not researching, writing, or teaching about food history, I’m generally cooking, eating or thinking about food, perusing recipe books, or watching cookery programs on TV. I have been especially fascinated by all things Mexico since I read Bernal Díaz’s A True History of the Conquest of New Spain as a teenager, and I think Mexican cuisine is the best in the world. 

I’ve been fascinated by absurdist comedy and ideas for as long as I can remember. At sixteen, I wrote my first book, Mr A, which followed a man who would turn into a superhero after taking LSD and his talking dog. As an adult, I continue to revel in these types of stories. I brought this passion to my chart-topping debut non-fiction book, where I interviewed several people who believe McDonald’s has interdimensional properties. Now, I hold no bars in fiction writing, having authored a ‘genius of a book’ that follows a talking pencil.

Charlie Jane Anders is the author of All the Birds in the Sky, which Time Magazine listed as one of the hundred best fantasy novels of all time. Her other books include The City in the Middle of the Night, Victories Greater than Death, and Never Say You Can't Survive: How to Get Through Hard Times By Making Up Stories. She organizes the long-running spoken word series Writers With Drinks, helps to organize tours of local bookstores, and also co-hosts the podcast Our Opinions Are Correct. Her short fiction has appeared in Tin House, Conjunctions, Wired Magazine, Slate, and the Boston Review.

My name is Laura Cathcart Robbins and I am the author of the ‘Quit Lit’ memoir, Stash, My Life In Hiding. When I got sober in 2008 I was full of shame and reluctant to share my struggles with addiction with my friends. Because I’ve always been a voracious reader, I scoured bookstores for stories like mine. It was on these shelves that I found my community, addiction stories to which I could relate and connect. These books were the foundation of my recovery. Now they live on my bookshelves at home and I lend them (with enthusiasm) to anyone who wants to examine their relationship with substances.

I have always liked antiheroes and characters that are in some way doomed. To me, there’s something romantic about them. And over time I have come to replace the fictional protagonists of noir and horror with antiheroes from real life. With miserable authors who wrote about their own lives, where instead of gangsters or monsters, they waged battle against themselves, against their own demons and despair. Books like these have kept me company during some of the darkest periods of my life, and their unflinching honesty has inspired me to become a writer. Perhaps they can do the same for you.