Tweak: Growing Up on Methamphetamines

by Nic Sheff

Book Overview

The story that inspired the major motion picture Beautiful Boy featuring Steve Carell and Timoth e Chalamet.

This New York Times bestselling memoir of a young man's addiction to methamphetamine tells a raw, harrowing, and ultimately hopeful tale of the road from relapse to recovery.

Nic Sheff was drunk for the first time at age eleven. In the years that followed, he would regularly smoke pot, do cocaine...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 153443657X
• ISBN13: 9781534436572
• Release Date: September 2018
• Publisher: Atheneum Books for Young Readers
• Length: 352 Pages
• Weight: 0.70 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.0" x 5.4" x 8.2"
• Age Range: 13 to 17 years
• Grade Range: Grades 8 to 12

Customer Reviews

Heart Wrenching

I read his dad's book so decided to read Nic's book and am glad I did. It was a very moving story of his struggles with drug addiction and the hard road to recovery. Recommend this book.

This is the Best Book I Have Ever Read.

This is definitely a page-turner. Never a dull moment! What a talented author!

Page Turner

Found this story more compelling than Beautiful Boy. Loved it and Nic Sheff's work.

Heartwrenching

Absolutely heartwrenching and at the same time one of the most beautiful books I've ever read, I couldn't put it down.

What he put himself through!

Riveting book about how Nic got involved with drugs and the years-long journey getting off them. Can't believe what he put himself through, including re-habs, lying, stealing and almost dying - just to get and take drugs. Might sound funny, but he actually sounded like he could be a nice guy if he wasn't all screwed up on drugs.

Explicit and a soul wrenching read

As a mom of an recovering meth and heroin addict, this was a heart wrenching and sad story. I honestly had to put it away, out of sight. It hurt my heart something fierce. So it’s not a book that’s hard to understand. It’s hard to read that this young child did this to his body. I congratulate him on his success in recovery.

Wonderful

A few years ago when I was 13 I learned my mom was a former meth addict So I wanted to learn about what it might have been like for her I have a good idea but other than that the book is still very good

Good for friends/family of addicts

First things first, while the content is graphic, the novel does read like a young adult book. So the 4 stars are actually for how much this book helped me, personally. Nic's a lot like my own family member and hearing his story from his point of view really helped me realize how best to navigate a relationship with an addict and what's reasonable/realistic to expect or hope for. I would ABSOLUTELY recommend reading this AFTER reading "Beautiful Boy". Nic has really given us something vital--the crucial and oft missing piece of the addicted family circle: the side of the story no one knows how to understand. It is only understanding that will allow us to forgive. This book helps you get closer that that. Thanks, Nic.

insight into daughter's addiction

Excellent book, very well-written. It provided much insight into my daughter's recovering addiction, and I greatly appreciate the honesty. Some questions I could not ask were answered in the book. It is very graphic, however, be fore-warned; but it is worth reading.

Don't Go Into That Closet!

First off, I should say that I'm not one of those "I read it cover to cover in one day" kind of readers. I hear people say "I couldn't put it down" when describing a book and wonder what kind of life - obviously devoid of things needing to be DONE - they live. That said, I read "Tweak" - cover to cover - in one day. I couldn't put it down. I've had friends addicted to meth. I know that meth's grip is insidious and tenacious - that the predictable and almost-methodical way it destroys everything in a person's life is almost viral in nature. But seeing this "inside look" at how a meth addict perceives his addiction, his drug, his life, and the destruction of everything perceived as valuable - occurring right before his eyes... it's a compelling, haunting narrative. The most striking thing for me in Nic's story is how at the very bottom - when virtually all is lost - the only thing that remains is the most sober of thoughts: "it's time to get clean". And at a time and in a condition where no hidden reservoirs of strength remain, the fight of a lifetime begins. Watching Nic's recovery is like watching the heroine in a horror flick walk (usually backwards... go figure) into a closet where the slasher villain is lying in wait to kill her. You recognize the villain and the precariousness of the situation long before Nic does - and you're screaming "don't go in there" - because by this point, you see how far he's come and you're rooting for him to make it and you see the disaster about to happen. It's interesting that Nic's father (who also writes "the parent's perspective" of his son's addiction in Beautiful Boy: A Father's Journey Through His Son's Meth Addiction) is involved in the production of horror movies, because his story has so many elements of a great horror movie. There are many heroes in this story aside from Nic - his family and his sponsor (Spencer) chief among them. To open yourself up to participating - emotionally investing - in a life with someone who repeatedly has shredded all sense of normalcy, safety and comfort - that takes a healthy dose of courage, perseverance, and love. Those are the hallmarks of every great hero, and his father, step-mother, mother, sponsor (and his wife) bear all of these hallmarks. Read this book to reaffirm your faith in the strength of the human spirit - its dogged determination to survive, its desire to thrive and its capacity to forgive. Give this book to the young people in your life to instill an honest, powerful image of how drugs can destroy a life and inflict pain and sadness on everyone connected to that life. But be prepared to lose a day, because you're not going to want to put it down.

Stunning, beautiful, sad, and ultimately healing

I just finished this-- couldn't put it down once I started. I went through every emotion you can imagine. Believe it or not, some of the story is really funny -- I laughed aloud -- but I also cried. THere were entire sections during which I didn't breath. And finally I felt something you don't always feel in books about this subject: genuine, pure, true hope.

Tweak

This book was wonderfully written, I was unable to put it down. The author, with all honesty, graphically takes you through the stages of addiction and exposes himself and his struggle to lead a sober life. I wish him the best in his sober life and hope that this book helps others, as much as it helped me, to understand the darkness of addiction.