Burlington, WI -- (SBWIRE) -- 03/21/2014 -- By the start of April, National Alcohol Awareness Month, more than 22,000 Americans will have died from alcoholism or alcohol-related illnesses and crashes. The National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism notes 21.9 percent of women and 42.3 percent of men have three or more drinks on a “typical” drinking day. “What few of them realize,” according to author and journalist Scott Stevens, “Is that alcohol is a carcinogen, is a leading cause of 60 preventable illnesses and one in 12 adults cannot even have one drink safely.”
Stevens' award-winning non-fiction book, Every Silver Lining Has a Cloud: Relapse and the Symptoms of Sobriety is a unique, bold take on sobriety. Using startling statistics and fresh medical discoveries interwoven with his personal account of the disease of alcoholism, Stevens relays the symptoms of sobriety, key stressors that lead to relapse and success factors that help keep relapse at bay. The result is required reading for an alcoholics in any stage of recovery and their loved ones. It exposes health risks for non-alcoholics during Alcohol Awareness Month and also answers the question many alcoholics and those around them wonder: Why would anyone return to the misery once they're sober?
Other recovery books are written like clinical texts by scientists, not alcoholics. Stevens is a prolific health writer with more than 100 alcoholism articles. With Every Silver Lining Has a Cloud, he admits he's had to “eat his own cooking.” A financial executive by day, Stevens once had a two-liters-a-day whiskey problem.
“I wrote the book because I wanted to tell how relapse feels and what leads up to it. You don't need a Ph.D. or M.D. to read it, and I felt it was important to include real experience plus the clinical research. Using my own story let me say to alcoholics, 'I'm just like you. I have been through the emotions, from anger to joy, before and after quitting.' The Alcohol Awareness Month message in the back third of the book gives compelling medical reasons to not drink in the first place. The material leading up to it is research I wish I knew when I was struggling.”
Every Silver Lining Has a Cloud: Relapse and the Symptoms of Sobriety has been well-received by the recovery community nationally and internationally and has several five-star reviews on the print and e-book versions at all book retailers.
About the Author: Stevens
Stevens is a noted journalist on alcoholism. His books on the disease include 2010's What the Early Worm Gets. For more information on the new book, please visit www.alcohologist.com