If you search on Google the term how to write a good introduction for a book you will find a step by steg guide that will be something like this:
- The Hook (Grab Attention)
Start with a powerful, engaging opening that draws the reader in immediately. - The Problem Statement & Solution (Create Value)
Define the core issue your reader is facing and offer your book as the solution. - Establish Authority (Build Trust)
Explain why you are the right person to write this book. - Set Tone and Expectations
Then you will see a part saying: Tips for Success.
Well, as a tips for success, you generally find: Keep it Short and the most important one, “Address the Reader Directly“.
Well, I personally published some books, so I want to share with you the introduction of my last one, The Last High, where I think I nailed the Address the Reader Directly tip.
At the end, if you want and have time, let me know if I did it correctly.
The Last High (Pre-Introduction)
I’ve wasted years trying to shove this book down the throats of the usual publishers.
Not for some shiny ego trip.
I know the road coming, I’ve walked it raw.
I’ve sat through every expert, every self-anointed doctor, every specialist with their diplomas and their soft hands.
All of them are full of shit.
Listen closely.
Everybody’s selling something.
Nobody’s selling a way out.
They’re selling another chain.
I tried the clean route: agents, editors, bookstores.
The money men didn’t bite.
First question out of their mouths: “Word count?”
What the fuck.
Let me spell it out.
I’m the expert because I clawed my way out.
Not from books, not from clinics.
From the floor, from the vomit, from the shakes that felt like my bones were trying to rip through my skin.
I didn’t let them hook me on their new chemical Jesus for life.
Too short?
A cure needs five hundred pages of fluff?
If you need that many words to say something, you never understood it in the first place.
I sat in those corporate rooms.
Suits sweating under the lights, hours of talking in circles while the clock bled.
Empty suits, empty mouths.
Fuck that noise.
This world only opens doors for friends or for products that fit the box.
Everything else gets left in the hallway.
I come to you with nothing but the truth scraped off my own bones.
Humility ain’t pretty, but it’s all I got left.
I hope these words hit you in the gut, I hope they cut through the fog and let you taste something real again.
I hope you grab the wheel before the crash takes the rest of you.
If I wanted to jerk off in public I could’ve bloated this thing into another Foucault’s Pendulum. You know the one.
Only the terminally bored claim they finished it.
Even then I doubt they did.
An addict doesn’t have time for that shit.
He’s too busy trying not to shit his pants while the dope sweats out of him.
Too busy tasting metal and bile and the sour stink of yesterday’s fix.
He needs somebody who’s been there, not another Instagram sermon or a fifty-minute clock-watcher nodding at the right times.
He’s already living in his own private Hell, twenty-four fucking seven.
Skin crawling like ants under the flesh, stomach knotted so tight he can’t tell if he’s hungry or dying.
Heart slamming against his ribs like it wants out, and veins screaming for the needle even when the needle’s the thing killing him.
I’ve sat across from those psychologists, the ones who ask the scripted questions while their eyes flick to the clock.
Fifty minutes.
See you next Tuesday.
Here’s your script for the next episode of your personal horror show.
They read two books written by other experts who never felt their asshole clench in withdrawal so hard they thought they’d tear.
Then they look at you and say, “You’re bipolar.”
This bitch met me years after I’d already killed every demon I had.
Drugs. Booze. Food. Pussy. All of them.
I didn’t just beat them, I ground them into the dirt and pissed on the graves.
She sat there with her clean nails and her neat little diagnosis, already counting the monthly checks from the pharmacy.
A pill to keep me coming back.
A customer for life.
Who the fuck do you think you’re talking to?
I used to eat motherfuckers like you before breakfast.
Truth is, I don’t even eat breakfast.
So you’re not even worth the calories.
I’ve been to the bottom, I’ve licked the floor, I’ve felt the cold sweat running down my back while my guts tried to crawl out my throat.
I’ve watched my hands shake so bad I couldn’t hold the spoon.
I’ve tasted the sweet rot of every fix and every crash.
And I beat them, one by one, sometimes two or three at the same time, laughing while they screamed.
So tell me, you mediocre shrinks, you influencer cunts, you editors who only care about page count and market fit, what the fuck do you bring to the table?
That the book’s too short?
We live in a world of polished lies and shallow graves.
Save yourself.
Nobody else is coming.
I hope these pages, short as they are, reach you before the next fix does.
Before the next shake.
Before the next voice in your head tells you one more time won’t hurt.
To every editor, agent, publisher, psychologist, psychiatrist, and every other parasite who tried to box this thing up or water it down:
Fuck you.
You’re sell-outs.
You’re empty.
You’re fucking unnecessary.
And I don’t need you.
The Last High
Most addiction books want to help you feel understood. This one wants you to feel responsible. The Last High isn't about substance abuse. It's about escape, and the uncomfortable reality that everyone is escaping something. Written from the inside, without sympathy asked or given.
