12

Synopsis

One of the first rules of Alcoholics Anonymous is to protect your anonymity. Should weeven be talking about 12?

Joshua Robbins’s explosive first memoir comes to us from the point of view of a struggling alcoholic whose suicidal behavior has lead him to treatment three times in one year. Struggling with addiction, alcoholism, materialism, Joshua finds temporary solace in a 12-step support group that is slowly driving him crazy because the only focus on the fear of alcohol and addiction. Here enters Ghandi. With the same feelings towards these support groups and illness, Ghandi forces Joshua to look past the idea that recovery is not about drinking or using but becoming conscious one day at a time. The only problem is finding a sponsor and buying into a program that believes this. And then we meet Grey Hair, the Robbins’s pillar of wisdom and truth.

Enter True Recovery. From blowing up Robbins’s perception to destroying every recovery myth, Robbins forms an alliance with Grey Hair to discover his true nature as a human-being surviving in the wilderness we call modern day America. Spinning into consciousness, Robbins walks though the steps (each chapter is represents astep), chapter by chapter, to find the true meaning of abstinence and recovery.

Robbins’s work here offends, comically excites, and provides thought-provoking scenarios to readers. And if that's not good enough, the jaw-dropping realization Robbins has about who he is at the conclusion of 12 should be enough. And if that doesn't leave you wanting more, then there's nothing to be done with you.

In the words of the author, “"I drank myself into oblivion, blowing a .512. I've placed a pistol to my head and couldn't pull the trigger. I've tried jobs, education, money and sex. Nothing could ever fill the emptiness I felt inside, change my distaste for the world, satisfy my craving for self-destruction, or stop the crawling of my skin. Though I have no semblance of a life outside of recovery at the moment, this is now what my life is. I am located somewhere in between the dark and the light. I am balanced yet flawed. I am perfecting yet incomplete. This is the story of the insane finding sanity, the lost being found, the faithless being delivered faith, and the simplicity of having Johnny Cash as a higher power."