"Craziness, dark secrets, alcoholic furies, that's how you become an alcoholic, right? It's encoded in your DNA, embedded in your history, the product of some wild familial aberration. There was always an undercurrent of moral failing in the stories I heard about alcoholics: they were unstable, unwell, irresponsible, and if they were parents, they tore through the lives of their children like tornadoes, drinking and divorcing, screaming and raging." Chap. 3, pp. 28-29

"My father had a probing manner, an analytic intensity tempered by a vague detachment, and whenever I sensed him turn his attention to me, the feeling on my part was instinctual and claustrophobic." Chap. 3, pp. 33-34

"But drinking was so much more effective, its comfort so much more reliable. Over time, over many, many drinks, that knowledge is incorporated, the lessons folded into the soul: Liquor eases. Liquor soothes and protects, a physic balm." Chap. 5, p...