Leaving Dirty Jersey is pegged as one man's descent into drug abuse and his subsequent recovery. The question is do we really care enough to read the whole book?

The author penned his tale at the tender tale of 22, and this memoir chronicles his year-long battle with complete honesty, but it's often this honesty that makes it hard to feel sorry for him. At 17-years-old James was introduced to heroin by his brother and he then went on to be arrested for possession of coke, heroin and ecstasy. Sent to a rehab program in California, James had two choices - clean up or live a drug-fuelled life of addiction. James chose a life of drugs and it was the very people he met while in rehab that saw him trade his comfortable life for sleeping on friend's sofas, lying to his family and constantly on the look out for his next hit. Readers will be pleased to hear that he does clear up his act - but it takes a near-psychotic event for him to take this step.

The problem with this book is that such a large chunk is devoted to his life as an addict and you struggle to feel sorry for someone who has made his own choices. It's a book that no doubt will be likened to James Frey's A Million Little Pieces, but Leaving Dirty Jersey lacks the grittiness and the ability to make the reader empathise with the writer's plight.