Dopesick
Beth Macy
Like Chasing the Scream, it traces how a drug crisis was shaped by corporate decisions and policy failures, following the people most affected through reported, on-the-ground journalism.
12 books to read next
Books Like Chasing the Scream
If you loved Chasing the Scream by Johann Hari
Readers who love Chasing the Scream usually come for its mix of storytelling and argument: a personal search, prompted by addiction in the author's own family, that turns into a global investigation. The book is reported in an accessible, conversational voice, moves briskly between history, interviews and science, and challenges the assumption that addiction is a failure of willpower. If you want narrative nonfiction that questions conventional wisdom and follows real people through hard evidence, these picks should feel familiar.
Investigating the American drug crisis
Dreamland
Sam Quinones
Quinones reconstructs how opioids spread through American towns, combining sharp reporting with human stories, much as Hari does when he documents how drug policy plays out in real communities.
The New Jim Crow
Michelle Alexander
It examines how the war on drugs fed mass incarceration and racial injustice, expanding the policy critique that Chasing the Scream makes about the drug war's origins and damage.
Rethinking habit and compulsion
Behave
Robert M. Sapolsky
Sapolsky explains the biology of behaviour, including reward and stress, with the same curiosity Hari brings to the science behind addiction, though at a much greater depth.
The Molecule of More
Daniel Z. Lieberman, Michael E. Long
Lieberman explores how dopamine drives craving and compulsion, offering a readable scientific account that complements Hari's argument about what really lies beneath addiction.
The Power of Habit
Charles Duhigg
Duhigg's clear, story-led look at how habits form and can be changed suits readers who were drawn to Chasing the Scream's reframing of compulsive behaviour.
Connection and belonging
Bowling Alone
Robert D. Putnam
Putnam documents the decline of community ties in America, supporting the central idea of Chasing the Scream that the opposite of addiction is connection.
Man's Search for Meaning
Viktor Emil Frankl
Frankl's account of surviving the camps and his view that meaning sustains people echoes Hari's conclusion that human bonds matter more than isolation in recovery.
The Body Keeps the Score
Bessel A. Van der Kolk
Van der Kolk links trauma, the body and healing, offering a science-based perspective on the same question Hari asks about why some people become trapped in addiction.
Personal stories of addiction
Tweak
Nic Sheff
Sheff's frank memoir of addiction to methamphetamine gives a first-person view of the struggle that Chasing the Scream explores through research and interviews.
Hillbilly Elegy
J. D. Vance
Vance's memoir of a struggling Appalachian community touches on opioids and despair, appealing to readers who valued the human stories and social context in Hari's book.
Just Mercy
Bryan Stevenson
Stevenson's account of fighting for people caught in an unfair justice system shares Hari's focus on how punitive policy harms individuals and communities.
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