Disclaimer: nothing in this post should be taken or held as clinical instruction, clinical supervision, or advisory concerning patient care.
I’ll hedge my answer and say the three books I list below are the ones I tend to suggest to clinicians that they read as a resource for their own learning.
And from that on-going learning project they could perhaps better develop and determine their own answer(s) to this question.
It is a great question.
Here are the three books, in no particular order:
- Get Your Loved One Sober: Alternatives to Nagging, Pleading, and Threatening
- The Alcoholic Family in Recovery: A Developmental Model
- Love First: A Family’s Guide to Intervention
I’ve found that most addiction counselors can significantly benefit from reading these three..

A Guide for the Family of the Alcoholic (P7, Al-Anon Pamphlet), the Detachment bookmark (S19, Al-Anon), Hope & Understanding for Parents and Grandparents (P94, Al-Anon Pamphlet), How can I help my Children? (P9, Al-Anon Pamphlet), and To Parents of Alcoholics (P16, Al-Anon Pamphlet)