Victoria Vanstone grew up in 1980s England in a happy home full of laughter, booze and a disturbing amount of fancy-dress parties. From her youthful days downing cheap wine at the local park to dodging disastrous relationships, her reliable mate alcohol was never far from reach. Eventually, Victoria found herself with a husband and a child on the way. After sobering up for her first pregnancy, becoming a boring, bottom-wiping, cleaning machine meant she soon returned to her binge-drinking ways, and had to grapple anew with the habits and beliefs that had gone unchecked since childhood.

In Push Off from Here, McKowen delves deeply into each of her nine points: what they mean, how they work, and how every person can live them. She addresses topics such as the correlation between trauma and addiction, the importance of radical honesty, letting go of the illusion of control, the value of community, a reminder that healing is a continual process, and that the process is a gift. Whether you’re just starting out or have been sober for decades, McKowen instructs us to be kind to ourselves: Change is messy and progress is rarely linear, but we can always push off from here.

In Alcohol Explained 2 William Porter develops his insight into the alcohol phenomenon, and provides the tools you need to retake control of your life for good.

This book is about pleasure. It’s also about pain. Most important, it’s about how to find the delicate balance between the two, and why now more than ever finding balance is essential. We’re living in a time of unprecedented access to high-reward, high-dopamine stimuli: drugs, food, news, gambling, shopping, gaming, texting, sexting, Facebooking, Instagramming, YouTubing, tweeting....

Like many women, Clare Pooley found the juggle of a stressful career and family life a struggle, so she left her successful role as a managing partner in one of the world's biggest advertising agencies to look after her family. She knew the change wouldn't be easy, but she never expected to find herself an overweight, depressed, middle-aged mother of three who was drinking more than a bottle of wine a day and spending her evenings Googling 'am I an alcoholic?'