Q & A with Tim Elhajj

Why did you write Dopefiend?

This memoir builds on the success of my Modern Love essay, As a Father, I Was Hardly a Perfect Fit, a humorous essay about forging a long-distance relationship with my son. This story first appeared in the New York Times and received positive attention on blogs from fathers separated from their children. I also received encouraging emails from children raised in families where their father lived in another home.

Dopefiend is a recovery memoir, but it’s really about the lengths a father will go to find a satisfying relationship with his son. Sometimes you have to follow the most unlikely path to find the thing you want most. It is also a spiritual journey story, but it’s a decidedly irreverent trip.

What makes this book unique?

Dopefiend is a literary memoir about recovery from heroin addiction, but my story starts with my first days of recovery and doesn’t cover much of my addiction. While there are many memoirs about heroin addiction, mine focuses exclusively on the spiritual and emotional growth of recovery, often in an irreverent and humorous manner.

The combination of the father-son relationship-building material with the stuff on heroin addiction sets this story apart from the others.

How does Dopefiend address recovery?

Dopefiend is a celebration of twelve-step recovery, presented in twelve chapters, with each chapter using on of twelve values as its theme. Each value corresponds to one of the Twelve Steps. Together the chapters form a narrative that describes my experience of getting into recovery and building a relationship with my son. Linking the values with the narrative in this way provides an opportunity to tell a compelling story about twelve-step recovery without getting tangled in dogma or preachy instruction on abstinence.

Who is your target audience for this book?

People who enjoy literary memoirs, people who enjoy stories about fathers and sons, noncustodial parents (especially fathers), people in recovery.