Bibliography

Books, articles, writers, and thinkers who have influenced my work and my life

Sep 14, 2023

This is an incomplete and ever-growing, cross discipline, cross genre, cross topic bibliography of pieces of work that have influenced me over the years. I have loosely organized it by topic and form to make browsing it easier. I will keep adding to it so check back if you’re curious.

People often ask me for a list of my influences, particularly for my stance that no one is disposable and everyone deserves compassion. The truth is that my stubborn compassion grows out of my lived experience, my socialist politics, my knowledge of trauma, my love of addicts, my lifetime of reading fiction, my animist spirituality, and my solidarity with nonhuman animals, to name only a few sources. None of the works listed here gave me my politics or my principles; all of them played some role.

I like to move through levels, zooming in and zooming out to produce a holistic way of thinking and being. That means that my politics are as interested in the personal and the interpersonal as they are the economic and the global.

It should go without saying but my listing these works does not mean a total endorsement or agreement with the ideas therein. These works moved me. They changed me somehow. Some of them match my current thinking quite well. Others are things that I have moved on from but that still played a generative role in the development of my ideas. Still others compel me without my being in total agreement with them. And so on.

I want to encourage people to read and think widely and deeply. Don’t limit yourself to any particular genre, style, form, or framework. You don’t need a formal education. You don’t need permission. You don’t need to wait for some other time. Let your mind wander and hone your own capacity for critical thinking, connection making, discernment, and integrity. Make your own list of beloved thinkers.

I’m not here to tell you what to think. Neither are these thinkers. These ideas are just here for your consideration. Maybe you can make something entirely new with them.

I have done my best to link to places where you can access or buy the work that is not Amazon. If at all possible, I recommend taking the time to find places to buy that aren’t Amazon. Amazon has atrocious labour practices and is actively working to put independent bookstores out of business. If you are looking for audiobooks, Libro.fm is a non-Amazon option that supports small bookstores. If you want to track what you’re reading, StoryGraph is an alternative to the Amazon-owned Goodreads.

Trauma, Addiction, Healing, Recovery

Articles

Dissociation: An Insufficiently Recognized Major Feature of Complex PTSD by Onno van der Hart, Ellert R.S. Nijenhuis, and Kathy Steele

Books

The Heart of Addiction: A New Approach to Understanding and Managing Alcoholism and Other Addictive Behaviors by Lance Dodes

Breaking Addiction: A 7-Step Handbook for Ending Any Addiction by Lance Dodes

No Bad Parts: Healing Trauma and Restoring Wholeness with the Internal Family Systems Model by Richard Schwartz

Healing the Fragmented Selves of Trauma Survivors: Overcoming Internal Self-Alienation by Janina Fisher

The Myth of Normal: Trauma, Illness, & Healing in a Toxic Culture by Gabor Maté

In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts: Close Encounters with Addiction by Gabor Maté

When the Body Says No: The Cost of Hidden Stress by Gabor Maté

The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma by Bessel van der Kolk

How to Change Your Mind: What the New Science of Psychedelics Teaches Us About Consciousness, Dying, Addiction, Depression, and Transcendence by Michael Pollan

The Big Book, The Basic Text of Alcoholics Anonymous

The 12 Steps and 12 Traditions of Alcoholics Anonymous

Complex PTSD: From Surviving to Thriving by Pete Walker

Relationships, Attachment, Sexuality

Books

Mating in Captivity: Unlocking Erotic Intelligence by Esther Perel

The Power of Attachment: How to Create Deep and Lasting Intimate Relationships by Diane Poole Heller

Hold Me Tight: Seven Conversations for a Lifetime of Love by Sue Johnson

Come As You Are: The Surprising New Science That Will Transform Your Sex Life by Emily Nagoski

Sex at Dawn: How We Mate, Why We Stray, and What It Means for Modern Relationships by Christopher Ryan and Cacilda Jetha

Compersion: Meditations on Using Jealousy As a Path to Unconditional Love by Deborah Anapol

All About Love by bell hooks

Videos

Anxious Obsessing Makes You Unavailable (Insecure Attachment) by Alan Robarge

Socialism, Anti-Capitalism, The Left

Magazines, Journals

Nonsite.org is an online, open access, peer-reviewed quarterly journal of scholarship in the arts and humanities.

Jacobin is a leading voice of the American left, offering socialist perspectives on politics, economics, and culture.

Catalyst is a peer-reviewed journal with the focus to develop a theory and strategy with capitalism as its target — both in the North and in the Global South.

The Breach is an independent media outlet producing critical journalism to help map a just, viable future.