Last Drink To LA

I touched bottom, as alcoholics like to say, on 12 February 1983 (the date is slightly fuzzy).

Thirty-one years ago John Sutherland nearly lost everything to drink. A married man, with family, working as a visiting professor of English on the west coast of America, he awoke from a blackout to find he was lying next to a stranger – a very strange stranger. This was his morning of clarity; it was time to sober up. Or die.

Last Drink To La is part reportage, part confession, in which John takes a frank look at drinking culture on both sides of the Atlantic, weighing up the pros and cons of Alcoholics Anonymous, which since its launch nearly a century ago has sparked hot debate. Is it a cult, or the best life-saver drinkers have?

What John courageously ‘shares’ here is not a temperance tale (told to terrify, inform and instruct), not what AA calls ‘drunkalog’, but a moving and thought-provoking meditation – some thinking about drinking and the devastating effects it has on individuals, families and society at large.

“John Sutherland is among the handful of critics whose every book I must have. He's sharp-eyed and sharp-tongued, with a generous heart and a wise head.”
John Parini, author of The Last Station

“A remarkably honest book.”
The Guardian

“I don't know much about literature. I'm just a working class builder who struggles with drink. It's a superb book, full of insight and the sort of stuff that sticks around and bubbles up out of your sub-conscious when you need it to. ”
Andrew Henry, Amazon review

About John Sutherland

I touched bottom, as alcoholics like to say, on 12 February 1983 (the date is slightly fuzzy). Thirty-one years ago John Sutherland nearly lost everything to drink. A married man, with family, working as a visiting professor of English on [...]