Melissa Rice
Melissa Rice
Memoir | Self-development
Melissa Rice is one half of successful BBC Radio 5 Live podcast Hooked: The Unexpected Addicts, which won Broadcasting Press Guild Radio Programme of the Year 2020, BBC Best Community Podcast 2020 and a Silver British Podcast Award.
Melissa was a primary school teacher until 2016. After hospitalisation for her alcohol addiction and a period of rehabilitation at Clouds House, she submitted a winning pitch for the podcast Hooked: The Unexpected Addicts with her friend from rehab, Jade Wye, for the Rachael Bland New Podcast Award. Hooked’s aim was to debunk the stereotypes of who and what an addict is, interviewing real people, with regular lives, whose voices are rarely heard.
With help from the Amy Winehouse Foundation Melissa now lives in London. She is now a trustee of the Amy Winehouse Foundation, is special adviser to Alcohol Health Alliance and is policy assistant on alcohol health to Dan Carden MP. Sobering is her first book.
SOBERING: LESSONS LEARNT THE HARD WAY ON THINKING, DRINKING AND QUITTING
‘Unique, honest, witty, occasionally shocking, you need this uplifting, amazing book in your life.’
Steve Bland, You, Me and the Big C
‘Melissa’s unique combination of authenticity, personal experience and humour makes for an incredibly refreshing take on addiction and recovery. A much-needed book that will help individuals to find hope and society to rethink substance misuse.’
Shahroo Izadi, author of The Kindness Method
READER REVIEWS
‘I have just finished reading Sobering and I felt I had to write a review. I have read a number of “quit lit” books in the past, but none have affected me quite like this one. The author pulls no punches, this is an honest account of recovery. Some of the stories were truly heart-breaking, but throughout this book, there is humour and hope and I often found myself laughing out loud. I cannot praise this author highly enough for what is an incredibly candid , thought provoking and ultimately inspiring account of her road to recovery.’
Mrs Mitchell
‘This book was INCREDIBLE. It was so witty, funny, heartwarming and real. I couldn’t read it fast enough, a real page-turner and I was eager to read more. It was a mixture of light laughter, and a real tear jerker at times.
I felt a lot of identification and found it so helpful to know what Melissa has been through and how she got out the other side. There’s lots of “takeaways” that I can use in my own life.
Absolutely loved it.’
Magdalena
‘This was a brilliantly honest read by a very brave author and is by her own admission warts, p*ssbags and all, with lots of great information for anyone who is it has suffered In the past with addiction, poor mental health or both together. It is a look at the modern treatment of people in addiction and some great lessons and laughs as well as parts which will make you sad, the fact you read it in a scouse accent made it quite endearing throughout.’
