Drinking Games
Sarah Levy
Part memoir and part social critique, Drinking Games is about how one woman drank and lived — until sobriety freed her. Drinking Games explores the role alcohol has in our formative adult lives, and what it means to opt out of a culture completely enmeshed in drinking. Sarah explores what our short-term choices about alcohol do to our long-term selves and how it challenges our ability to be vulnerable enough to discover what we really want in life. more
288 pages, Hardcover
First published St. Martin's Press
3.78
Rating
5145
Ratings
692
Reviews
Sarah Levy
1 books 123 followers
Pre-order DRINKING GAMES (Jan 3, 2023) now! bit.ly/DrinkingGamesBookSarah Levy the author of DRINKING GAMES, a memoir in essays about the role alcohol has in our formative years, and what it means to opt out of a culture completely enmeshed in drinking. She has written for The New York Times, New York Magazine/The Cut, Cosmopolitan, Glamour, Vogue, and other publications. She is originally from New York and received her BA from Brown University. She lives in Los Angeles with her husband and their dog, Brie.
Community reviews
I'm so happy that the author found happiness and peace when she decided to live a sober life. Truly, it seems like it was a needed and healthy change for her. That being said, this book was an exercise in self-absorption. Click here to hear more of my thoughts on this book over on my Booktube channel, abookolive. more
Drinking Games by Sarah Levy is an honest deep-dive into the life of a problem-drinker-turned-sober Millennial. In it, she describes not only her drinking war stories and her subsequent sobriety but also address the issues that often accompany a diagnosis of substance abuse disorder. These issues include a fundamental lack of self-worth, obsession with body image, people pleasing, the loss of self-identity and of course, the social media comparison trap. While definitely targeted toward the female Millennial audience, this book is full of great writing and hard-earned insights that anyone can relate to. The reader gets to accompany Levy on her seemingly endless raucous nights in New York City where she encounters numerous close calls and plenty of cringeworthy situations as a result of her heavy drinking. more
Outlier opinion here. Despite the sea of four and five star reviews, I have to admit I really didn’t like this book. It took me several days to finish because I found the author so annoying. I’m not normally one to criticize an author for their privilege, especially not in a mental health or sobriety memoir—I figure we’re probably all just stumbling along trying to do the best we can in this life—but in this one, it just stuck out like a sore thumb. All the mentions of her Ivy League education, her hip and influential acquaintances, her jaunts to Europe and her six figure income really grated after awhile. more
(free review copy) I’m always up for a sobriety memoir and this one is very compelling. It feels like it’s more connected essays than a linear memoir and there is a bit of repetition, but I truly hope it will find the right readers because Sarah’s tale of her alcohol issues will resonate with so many young women. As will her overall anxiety and body image issues. This isn’t a “how to quit drinking” guide but it is one story of a woman on the verge who found sobriety and is in a light years different / better place because of it. I commend the author for her bravery in writing her story. more
This book makes me realize I really don’t like memoirs by entitled well to do white people. While I believe this writer had a true issue in her drinking the complaints she has in her day to day are sooo minor compared to some of the other stories I read it just sounds so ridiculous. She beats herself up for not doing her dishes or having a pile of unread books. Oh boy. This collection of essays makes her comes across as the most unassured young woman who ping pongs from trend to person looking for validation and some kind of direction. more
Sarah Levy has bared her very soul in writing this book about her addiction to alcohol. In the US, alcohol is available at every turn, at every moment, and we are home to millions of alcoholics. My father was one of them. He never beat the beast we call alcohol and I was a personal spectator to what it does to the human body and brain, and how those who become addicted can become totally different people. We sometimes forget alcohol is basically a legal addictive drug. more
TW: Alcoholism, cancer, eating disorder, peer pressure, dementia, language, classification *****SPOILERS***** About the book:Drinking Games explores the role alcohol has in our formative adult lives, and what it means to opt out of a culture completely enmeshed in drinking. Sarah explores what our short-term choices about alcohol do to our long-term selves and how it challenges our ability to be vulnerable enough to discover what we really want in life. While many millennial women will see themselves in Sarah's words and story, Drinking Games is dedicated to anyone who feels like their private struggles are terminally unique. Whether it’s alcohol, food, exercise, or work, so many of us are grasping for control and struggling to keep our heads above water. Candid, dynamic, Drinking Games speaks to the millennial experience of working hard, playing harder, and wanting everything to look perfect on social media. more
This was a well written memoir that will hook you from the first page. Levy was so honest in sharing her life. I found a lot of this to be relatable and could understand the decisions she made. She is such a strong person and sharing her story in the way she did takes a lot of courage. This is definitely a memoir you won’t want to miss. more
Thank you NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for accepting my request to read and review Drinking Games. Author: Sarah LevyPublished: 01/03/23Genre: Biographies & Memoirs | Nonfiction (Adult)Memoir displayed across the front cover and I missed it. I honestly was expecting a mystery. I Googled Sarah Levy when I saw memoir. more
Sarah Levy self-identified as a girl "down for anything" in her twenties. At the time, she saw this as a state of being effortlessly cool and as someone who could get along with everyone and have fun doing anything. But now that she's sober, Sarah sees that being "down for anything" really just made her boring and passionless. Sarah's memoir is really a collection of essays on how drinking alcohol shaped her life and her road to recovery. In some ways, Sarah's addiction and the ramifications felt slightly glossed over. more
Did not finish. I’m glad that Sarah got sober and seems to be in a better place but her inherent privilege is never addressed. It seems like her struggles are run of the mill. She has rich friends who cart her off to exotic places, an Ivy League education, tons of friends, a steady home and job. Like, a dude called you fat once so you became an alcoholic. more
I found the author unaware of her massive privilege and not terribly likable, drunk or sober. . more
Feels like you're holding a solo cup at a frat mixer, and it's time to move on, until I got to the moderation chapter, that kept me at the party, but then I wanted to leave again. more
Drinking Games is a memoir told in different essays about the author's experiences living in New York City after college and growing up in a "work hard, play hard" culture. Even though she was having many blackouts while drinking, it wasn't until the last blackout when she woke up next to her boss's best friend and didn't remember anything from the night before or how she got there. This event helped her get sober at the age of 28. The author wrote about how on the outside, nobody would ever really know she was an alcoholic because she was so high-functioning. After frequent blackouts, she started to feel like her brain was no longer forming short-term memories and or longer logging the interactions that she was having in real-time. more
I decided to read my copy of DRINKING GAMES over the long holiday break, and I enjoyed it so much. Part memoir/part essay, author Sarah Levy is completely transparent, sharing her honest struggles with alcohol in her 20's and 30's, which led to her sobriety. In a time where most of us are still figuring out who we are, and trying to navigate life as a young adult, I loved the honest approach that Sarah gave us readers. I found myself nodding along, remembering plenty of times that I used the crutch of alcohol, whether it be for social occasions, or to add confidence. I read both the physical and audiobook copies, and really enjoyed that the novel was read by the author. more
Completely unrelatable. I hate everything about this girl. Imagine if a Salinger character existed in 2022--that's her. more
Sarah Levy is a twenty-something resident of New York City, trying to be effortlessly cool, popular, the epitome of wellness and/or successful in the business world. However, she seems to be unable to stop drinking to excess, often blacking out before the night is through. This really throws a wrench in potential partnerships, her friendships, work-life, and her journey to self-love and acceptance. I mean, you can't really be well when you're an alcoholic, even if the next morning you try to make up for it by taking an excess amount of vitamins and doing strenuous exercise until you start seeing stars. This was so great and refreshing to read. more
Addiction memoir is always a difficult genre for me, not because I don’t respect the experiences and struggles of the author, but because I don’t connect with them for various reasons. That was true to some extent with Drinking Games, but I did find it a more pleasant read than I have other books of this type. Sarah Levy is honest about her struggles with alcohol and other issues of lacking self-worth, but I appreciate that she writes of these experiences in a way that feels optimistic. The essayistic style of this memoir lets you know that she’s sober and happy now, so reading through her darker periods doesn’t feel so heavy. That being said, there were some (smallish) issues I had with this book, too. more
dnf - 7%Rough and unrefined style, which is bad, but could be passable if the book is compelling enough. Well, this one isn't. I couldn't feel emphaty for the writer, and I had no interests in reading about her explaining over and over what a blackout due to drinking is. We got it. It could have been a blog article, it would have fitted better - woman denies she has a problem, until she sleeps with her boss' friend. more
3. 5/5. Easy read, slight “meeting that could have been an email” vibes but I still found it compelling and insightful. Not everything she talked about was relatable but enough of it was to make me think about my relationship with drinking. . more
ARC provided in exchange for an honest review. I really loved how Sarah Levy narrates her own book. It’s so wonderful to hear her read the story, which is only hers to tell. I haven’t read a memoir in quite sometime but really enjoyed this one. I come from a family of alcoholics so I always knew I was prone to drinking and made the decision in my early 20’s that I wasn’t a fan so I can see where the author is coming from. more
Sarah Levy bares her soul and faces her past in this memoir/social critique. "Drinking Games" is her journey from being "that girl" - the one always down for anything, the drinking buddy and the one who blacks-out and makes a funny story. through her sobriety journey to the happy life she has now created. While everyone's experience with alcohol is different, Sarah's stories are raw and relatable - we all have been in similar situations and/or know people in these situations. From relying on alcohol to make friends, tying it to your personality, the fear of being "uncool", living in a haze of selfishness and being overall unsafe. more
Hi Goodreads Admin. I read the "audio" version, but can't find that option for choosing a reading edition for this review. I chose instead "hardback", but will change it to audiobook if you add it. Thanks. Here's my review:I listened to this book on audio which was written and narrated by Sarah Levy. more
I wanted to love this book because i truly root for all the sober sisters out there but in the end, this felt unorganized and challenging to understand her timeline of booze related lessons, sobriety, and meeting her husband. I recognize its a book of essays but still feel like I don’t understand her story because it’s disjointed. The second piece of feedback is that while the author tells us about feeling shame and describes various black out events, she doesn’t show it in a way that creates vulnerability. Its that old English class mantra that is missing: Show vs Tell. Maybe my bar is too high after falling in love with Laura McKowen’s storytelling style or maybe she is just young and not there yet. more
First, Levy is so incredibly brave and vulnerable sharing her story. Because drinking is such an accepted, celebrated, even - aspect of our society, I believe many can sweep its potential severity under the rug quite easily. But the fact of the matter is that alcoholism is one of the most problematic issues of our culture. I, for one, applaud those who speak candidly about their experiences with alcohol and their choice to live an alcohol-free lifestyle. For whatever reason, there's almost a stigma that you can't have a fun and fulfilling life without alcohol, but as Levy writes, it's absolutely possible, and maybe even desirable. more
I really enjoyed Sarah Levy's account of being a woman in her 20s and struggling with issues that many of us face-body insecurities, dating and friendship woes, and how these really contribute to the culture of binge drinking. A lot of sobriety memoirs focus on the rock bottom moment, but I think she did a great job of changing that narrative, and how important it is to normalize conversations around alcohol use that's unhealthy. She also provides some really insightful experiences of life after quitting-navigating dating, holidays, work situations that revolve around drinking, and the pressures of social media. Really great debut, and as someone who reads a lot of memoirs about substance use and mental health, this one takes a unique and fresh approach to the subject. more
Thanks to netgalley for an early galley of this memoir. I'm not the target audience, who I assume is much younger than I. However, that aside, I thought the essays were repetitive and there were very few issues where the author dug deep. That might be due to her age, but overall, I was disappointed. I also found the timeline rough, typically asking myself, was this when she was newly sober or when she stopped drinking the first time. more
2. 5 stars rounded up to 3. I don't think the author has enough lived experience and sense of perspective to justify writing a memoir at this stage of her life (early 30s). The angle she used to sell her memoir (becoming recently sober) also isn't particularly unique. more
I couldn’t put levy’s book down. Fun, authentic, and so relatable. A must read. more
