Parched: A Memoir

One woman's journey to the bottom of the bottle-and back again.

In this moving, emotionally charged, and unflinching look at alcoholism and its effects, lawyer and prominent National Public Radio writer and commentator Heather King describes her twenty-year-long descent into the depths of addiction with wit and candor. King went from a highly functioning alcoholic who managed to maintain her grip on reality to living in the lowest of dive bars, drinking around the clock and barely sustaining an existence. With help from the most unexpected source, King stopped her self-destructive spiral and changed her world for the better. This is the poignant, painfully honest, and inspirational true story of a woman who looked into the abyss, and was able to step back from the edge and reclaim her life on her own terms.