New Books in Drugs, Addiction and Recovery

Marshall Poe

50 episodes listed below

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Careful conversations on drugs, treatment, and recovery.

The gist

New Books in Drugs, Addiction and Recovery treats drugs as historical, medical, legal, and moral subjects. Its conversations move patiently through books and reports on coca, opioids, methadone, sobriety, rural economies, and the drug war.

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About New Books in Drugs, Addiction and Recovery

New Books in Drugs, Addiction and Recovery is a scholarly interview channel for listeners who want drug policy and addiction discussed with patience rather than slogans. The conversations are bookish, but not sealed off. Episodes usually center on a new book or report, then widen into the historical and institutional forces behind it. Coca becomes a way to talk about Victorian botany, pharmaceutical manufacturing, British trade, German industry, and knowledge networks. Colombia’s coca economy becomes a question of rural livelihoods, legal crops, armed groups, and the pressure created when corporate agriculture leaves farmers with few workable options. Opioid addiction is handled from several angles. Some episodes examine methadone clinics, Certified Opioid Treatment Programs, and the everyday consequences of surveillance-heavy treatment systems. Others look at addiction through philosophy, neuroscience, social context, and the limits of the brain disease model. The show is calm. It is also willing to be severe when the material calls for it. Helen Redmond’s episode frames methadone clinics through policing, punishment, stigma, and racialized control. Hanna Pickard’s conversation asks what addiction looks like when isolation, suffering, and environmental poverty are taken seriously. The Recall This Book rebroadcast brings opiate addiction into dialogue with ethics, compulsion, social damage, and further reading. There is room for sobriety, too. John Beyer’s episode places sobriety beside family life, Alcoholics Anonymous, work, and responsibility without turning the story into a simple redemption arc. The show’s recurring value is careful translation. Hosts and guests often move from technical language to plainer meaning, then back again to the argument. It is strongest for listeners who want drugs understood as plants, medicines, markets, laws, habits, harms, and forms of survival. The result is sober, humane, and unusually good at showing how addiction debates are shaped long before a person reaches a clinic, courtroom, farm, or recovery meeting.

Made for: For readers, researchers, clinicians, policy watchers, students, and historically minded listeners who want addiction and drug policy treated with nuance. It is especially suited to people who prefer sustained interviews over quick takes.

What sets it apart: The show places drugs and addiction inside long systems: trade, law, medicine, agriculture, stigma, treatment rules, and moral argument. It stands apart by letting scholars and authors build context slowly instead of forcing every episode into a single policy answer.

In their own words

This podcast is a channel on the New Books Network. The New Books Network is an academic audio library dedicated to public education. In each episode you will hear scholars discuss their recently published research with another expert in their field. Discover our 150+ channels and browse our 28,000+ episodes on our website: ⁠newbooksnetwork.com⁠ Subscribe to our free weekly Substack newsletter to get informative, engaging content straight to your inbox: ⁠https://newbooksnetwork.substack.com/⁠ Follow us on Instagram and Bluesky to learn about more our latest interviews: @newbooksnetworkSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/drugs-addiction-and…

As heard by us

Based on 6 episodes we listened to · September 2026

Author interviews connect addiction's present controversies to the policies, institutions, ideas, and lived histories that produced them.

New Books in Drugs, Addiction and Recovery turns conversations with authors into histories of how addiction is defined, governed, and lived. Emily Dufton's interviews trace the institutions and ideas behind current practice, from the punitive structure of American methadone…

Read our full review in PlayNext →

Why you'd press play

Methadone clinics meet cocaine philosophy, and your easy answers do not survive the author interviews.

Press play if you want

  • scholars to test the brain-disease model against environment, choice, and relief
  • a clinic-level look at how methadone treatment can turn care into control
Read the full recommendation in PlayNext →
coca historyopioid addiction treatmentmethadone clinic regulationdrug war historyrural coca economiesaddiction philosophysobriety and recoverystigma and criminalization

Talks about

Best episodes of New Books in Drugs, Addiction and Recovery

Short reviews from the PlayNext desk, based on the episodes we processed.

Alex Diamond, "Governing the Excluded: Rural Livelihoods Beyond Coca in Colombia's Peace Laboratory" (U Chicago Press, 2026)Apr 6, 2026

A clear-eyed conversation about coca, rural survival, and the political costs of crop substitution in Colombia.

Alex Diamond's Governing the Excluded opens on a hard rural question: when cheap agricultural products drive down prices for coffee, corn, and beans, what options remain for families trying to stay on the land and live from it?

167* Addiction with Gina Turrigiano (EF, JP)Mar 26, 2026

A measured review of addiction as personal compulsion shaped by history, context, and social consequence.

The episode treats opiate addiction less as a headline issue than as a condition shaped by history, social context, and competing ways of thinking about the body and the self.

Helen Redmond, "Liquid Handcuffs: Policing and Punishment in Methadone Clinics and the Future of Opioid Addiction Treatment" (North Atlantic Books, 2026)Mar 3, 2026

A clear history of how methadone treatment became tied to surveillance, daily attendance, and control.

Liquid Handcuffs frames methadone clinics as the product of policy choices that made surveillance and daily attendance central to care. Helen Redmond traces the system's nationwide spread by the mid-1970s to the criminalized status of people who use drugs, then follows the…

John Beyer, "Live a Little Better: One Man's Journey of Survival, Sobriety, and Success" (Worth, 2025)Feb 25, 2026

A sober life is measured through family responsibility, work, and the discipline of giving back.

John Byron's sobriety is framed less as a single victory than as a daily structure for responsibility. After Gregory was diagnosed with autism at age two, Byron describes six or seven sober years as the footing that let him absorb a changed family reality, think about care, and…

Hanna Pickard, "What Would You Do Alone in a Cage with Nothing But Cocaine?: A Philosophy of Addiction" (Princeton UP, 2026)Feb 24, 2026

A sharp, humane challenge to the brain disease model of addiction.

Hannah Pickard opens the conversation with a stark question: what might someone do alone in a cage with nothing but cocaine? Her answer shifts the focus away from a simple story of a hijacked brain and toward isolation, emptiness, suffering, and the way drugs can seem to offer…

Mark Deuze, "Well-Being and Creative Careers: What Makes You Happy Can Also Make You Sick" (Intellect Books, 2025)Dec 14, 2025

A clear look at how creative work can feel rewarding and ruinous at the same time.

Mark Duzza, a professor of media studies at the University of Amsterdam and author of Wellbeing and Creative Careers: What Makes You Happy Can Also Make You Sick, makes a plain but sturdy case that the traits that pull people into creative work can also wear them down.

Podcasts like New Books in Drugs, Addiction and Recovery

Episodes

  1. 1

    Kim Embrey, "Coca and the Victorians: From Botanical Curiosity to Regulated Drug, 1835–1912" (Transcript Publishing, 2025)

    This episode features an interview with Dr.

    Apr 12, 2026·25m
  2. 2

    Alex Diamond, "Governing the Excluded: Rural Livelihoods Beyond Coca in Colombia's Peace Laboratory" (U Chicago Press, 2026)

    Hidden gem

    Sociologist Alex Diamond discusses his book Governing the Excluded: Rural Livelihoods Beyond Coca in Colombia's Peace Laboratory with host Sneha Navarapu on the New Books Network, drawing on about three years living in the Colombian village of Briceño.

    Apr 6, 2026·1h 4m·5 clips
  3. 3

    167* Addiction with Gina Turrigiano (EF, JP)

    This rebroadcast of Recall This Book, hosted by anthropologist Elizabeth Ferry and literature professor John Plotz with guest neuroscientist Gina Turrigiano, uses three books to examine opiate addiction from biology, anthropology, and literature.

    Mar 26, 2026·47m·3 clips
  4. 4

    Helen Redmond, "Liquid Handcuffs: Policing and Punishment in Methadone Clinics and the Future of Opioid Addiction Treatment" (North Atlantic Books, 2026)

    Hidden gem

    Host Emily Dufton interviews social worker, filmmaker, and self-described 'clinic abolitionist' Helen Redmond about her new book Liquid Handcuffs, which argues America's federally created methadone clinic system should be eradicated entirely.

    Mar 3, 2026·56m·4 clips
  5. 5

    John Beyer, "Live a Little Better: One Man's Journey of Survival, Sobriety, and Success" (Worth, 2025)

    Host Deidre Tyler Holtz interviews John Beyer about his memoir Live a Little Better, One Man's Journey of Survival, Sobriety, and Success, written at his daughter Lauren's urging.

    Feb 25, 2026·45m·3 clips
  6. 6

    Hanna Pickard, "What Would You Do Alone in a Cage with Nothing But Cocaine?: A Philosophy of Addiction" (Princeton UP, 2026)

    Philosopher Hannah Pickard discusses her book "What Would You Do Alone in a Cage with Nothing But Cocaine?

    Feb 24, 2026·49m·3 clips
  7. 7

    Emily Dufton, "Addiction, Inc: Medication-assisted Treatment and America's Forgotten War on Drugs" (U Chicago Press, 2026)

    This episode features an interview with author Emily Dufton about her book 'Addiction, Inc.' which explores medication-assisted treatment and America's forgotten war on drugs.

    Feb 18, 2026·1h
  8. 8

    Chris Washburn and Ron Chepesiuk, "Out of Bounds: From Broken NBA Dreams to Redemption" (WildBlue Press, 2025)

    An academic interview podcast where scholars discuss their recently published research with another expert in their field.

    Feb 9, 2026·52m
  9. 9

    Jonathan Gleason, "Field Guide to Falling Ill" (Yale UP, 2026)

    This episode features an interview with Jonathan Gleason about his new essay collection 'Field Guide to Falling Ill', discussing his background as a writer, medical interpreter, and the book's reception.

    Jan 27, 2026·52m
  10. 10

    Lesly-Marie Buer, "RX Appalachia: Stories of Treatment and Survival in Rural Kentucky" (Haymarket, 2020)

    An interview with Leslie Marie Buehr about her book on addiction treatment and survival in rural Kentucky.

    Jan 26, 2026·45m
  11. 11

    George Fisher, "Beware Euphoria: The Moral Roots and Racial Myths of America's War on Drugs" (Oxford UP, 2024)

    An academic interview with a law professor discussing his new book on the moral roots and racial myths of America's drug war.

    Jan 24, 2026·1h 3m
  12. 12

    How Do We Treat Opioid Addiction?

    This episode discusses a census of patients in Certified Opioid Treatment Programs and the medications they receive.

    Jan 19, 2026·56m
  13. 13

    Elizabeth Kelly Gray, "Habit Forming: Drug Addiction in America, 1776-1914" (Oxford UP, 2023)

    An academic interview podcast where scholars discuss their recently published research with an expert host.

    Jan 18, 2026·59m
  14. 14

    Jamie Rowen, "Worthy of Justice: The Politics of Veterans Treatment Courts in Practice" (Stanford UP, 2025)

    Jan 15, 2026·25m
  15. 15

    Mike Jay, "Psychonauts: Drugs and the Making of the Modern Mind" (Yale UP, 2023)

    Jan 6, 2026·44m
  16. 16

    David Nasaw, "The Wounded Generation: Coming Home After World War II" (Penguin, 2025)

    Dec 16, 2025·55m
  17. 17

    Mark Deuze, "Well-Being and Creative Careers: What Makes You Happy Can Also Make You Sick" (Intellect Books, 2025)

    Hidden gem

    Pete Kunze welcomes Mark Duzza to discuss Wellbeing and Creative Careers.

    Dec 14, 2025·1h 6m·5 clips
  18. 18

    Bradley J. Borougerdi, "Cannabis: A Global History" (Reaktion, 2025)

    Dec 4, 2025·50m
  19. 19

    Jonathan S. Jones, "Opium Slavery: Civil War Veterans and America's First Opioid Crisis" (UNC Press, 2025)

    Dec 2, 2025·38m
  20. 20

    Meg Bernhard, "Wine" (Bloomsbury, 2023)

    Nov 28, 2025·59m
  21. 21

    Shoshana Walter, "Rehab: An American Scandal" (Simon and Schuster, 2025)

    Nov 8, 2025·41m
  22. 22

    Aileen Teague, "Policing on Drugs: The United States, Mexico, and the Origins of the Modern Drug War, 1969-2000" (Oxford UP, 2025)

    Oct 22, 2025·55m
  23. 23

    Katie Herzog, "Drink Your Way Sober: The Science-Based Method to Break Free from Alcohol" (Simon and Schuster, 2025)

    Sep 30, 2025·55m
  24. 24

    Susan D. Stewart. "On the Rocks: Straight Talk about Women and Drinking" (Rowman & Littlefield, 2022)

    Sep 20, 2025·28m
  25. 25

    Susan C. Boyd, "Heroin: An Illustrated History" (Fernwood, 2022)

    Aug 24, 2025·45m
  26. 26

    Melody Glenn, "Mother of Methadone: A Doctor's Quest, a Forgotten History, and a Modern-Day Crisis" (Beacon Press, 2025)

    Aug 6, 2025·44m
  27. 27

    Judith Grisel, "Never Enough: The Neuroscience and Experience of Addiction" (Doubleday, 2019)

    Aug 4, 2025·1h
  28. 28

    Tricia Starks, "Smoking Under the Tsars: A History of Tobacco in Imperial Russia" (Cornell UP, 2018)

    Aug 3, 2025·1h
  29. 29

    Joseph Gfroerer, "War Stories from the Drug Survey: How Culture, Politics, and Statistics Shaped the National Survey on Drug Use and Health" (Cambridge UP, 2018)

    Jul 26, 2025·57m
  30. 30

    Ben Westhoff, "Fentanyl, Inc.: How Rogue Chemists Are Creating the Deadliest Wave of the Opioid Epidemic" (Grove Press, 2019)

    Jul 20, 2025·45m
  31. 31

    Owen Flanagan, "What Is It Like to Be an Addict?: Understanding Substance Abuse" (Oxford UP, 2025)

    Jun 11, 2025·41m
  32. 32

    John Lee Hooker Jr., "From the Shadow of the Blues: My Story of Music, Addiction, and Redemption" (Rowman & Littlefield, 2025)

    This episode is a survey request from the New Books Network, asking listeners to participate in an audience survey to help improve the network.

    May 5, 2025·54m
  33. 33

    Jonathan D. Cohen, "Losing Big: America's Dangerous Sports Gambling Boom" (Columbia Global Reports, 2025)

    This episode is a survey request and introduction to an interview about a book on drugs, addiction, and recovery.

    Apr 20, 2025·56m
  34. 34

    Walls, Warnings, and the War on Fentanyl: Peter Andreas on Trump’s Border Politics

    Mar 31, 2025·34m
  35. 35

    Alcohol

    Mar 3, 2025·20m
  36. 36

    Emine Ö Evered, "Prohibition in Turkey: Alcohol and the Politics of Identity" (U Texas Press, 2024)

    An academic interview about a new book on prohibition in Turkey, exploring alcohol and politics of identity in the late Ottoman Empire and early Republic.

    Feb 19, 2025·54m
  37. 37

    Philip Howell, "Pub" (Bloomsbury, 2025)

    An academic interview with Professor Philip Howell about his book 'Pub' from the Object Lessons series, exploring the history and cultural significance of the English pub.

    Feb 12, 2025·39m
  38. 38

    Patricia A. Roos, "Surviving Alex: A Mother's Story of Love, Loss, and Addiction" (Rutgers UP, 2024)

    This episode is a promotional segment for the New Books Network audience survey followed by an interview with an author about their new book.

    Feb 3, 2025·1h 13m
  39. 39

    Michael Ray Richardson, "Banned: How I Squandered an All-Star NBA Career Before Finding My Redemption" (Sports Publishing, 2024)

    Host Paul Knepper interviews Jake Udy about his book on Michael Ray Richardson's NBA career and redemption.

    Jan 18, 2025·57m
  40. 40

    Dayne C. Riley, "Consuming Anxieties: Alcohol, Tobacco, and Trade in British Satire, 1660-1751" (Bucknell UP, 2024)

    This episode is a survey request from the New Books Network, asking listeners to provide feedback to help improve the network.

    Jan 9, 2025·43m
  41. 41

    Benjamin T. Smith, "The Dope: The Real History of the Mexican Drug Trade" (W. W. Norton, 2021)

    An interview with historian Benjamin T.

    Jan 3, 2025·45m
  42. 42

    Lisa Sheryl Jacobson. "Intoxicating Pleasures: The Reinvention of Wine, Beer, and Whiskey After Prohibition" (U California Press, 2024)

    An interview with Dr.

    Dec 25, 2024·1h 29m
  43. 43

    Holly M. Karibo, "Rehab on the Range: A History of Addiction and Incarceration in the American West" (U Texas Press, 2024)

    An interview with Dr.

    Dec 11, 2024·44m
  44. 44

    Aisha M Beliso-de Jesús, "Excited Delirium: Race, Police Violence, and the Invention of a Disease" (Duke UP, 2024)

    An academic interview discussing a recently published anthropology book with the author.

    Dec 10, 2024·54m
  45. 45

    Jeffrey M. Pilcher, "Hopped Up: How Travel, Trade, and Taste Made Beer a Global Commodity" (Oxford UP, 2024)

    An academic interview discussing the history of beer as a global commodity and cultural artifact.

    Dec 6, 2024·52m
  46. 46

    Helena Hansen et al., "Whiteout: How Racial Capitalism Changed the Color of Opioids in America" (U California Press, 2023)

    Dec 5, 2024·1h 16m
  47. 47

    Daniel J. Mallinson and A. Lee Hannah, "Green Rush: The Rise of Medical Marijuana in the United States" (NYU Press, 2024)

    An academic interview discussing a new book on the rise of medical marijuana policy in the United States.

    Nov 28, 2024·52m
  48. 48

    Stuart Anderson, "Pharmacopoeias, Drug Regulation, and Empires: Making Medicines Official in Britain's Imperial World, 1618-1968" (McGill-Queen's UP, 2024)

    An academic interview about a book on the history of drug regulation and pharmacopoeias across empires.

    Nov 6, 2024·1h 3m
  49. 49

    Sanaullah Khan, "Carceral Recovery: Prisons, Drug Markets, and the New Pharmaceutical Self" (Lexington Books, 2023)

    This episode features an interview with Sanaullah Khan about his book 'Carceral Recovery: Prisons, Drug Markets, and the New Pharmaceutical Self', exploring the intersection of incarceration, drug markets, and pharmaceuticalization.

    Nov 3, 2024·52m
  50. 50

    Camilla Nord, "The Balanced Brain: The Science of Mental Health" (Princeton UP, 2024)

    This episode features an interview with neuroscientist Camilla Nord about her book 'The Balanced Brain: The Science of Mental Health', discussing mental health research and neuroscience.

    Sep 20, 2024·27m