FINALIST FOR THE KIRKUS PRIZE FOR NONFICTION • ONE OF TIME'S 100 MUST-READ BOOKS OF THE YEAR • ONE OF THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW'S CRITICS' PICKS • ONE OF THE BOSTON GLOBE’S 55 BOOKS WE LOVED THIS YEAR • ONE OF KIRKUS’S BEST NONFICTION BOOKS OF THE YEAR• An intimate, insightful, at times even humorous blend of memoir and philosophy that examines why the thought of death is so compulsive for some while demonstrating that there’s always another solution—from the acclaimed writer and philosophy professor, based on his viral essay, “I’m Still Here.”

“A deep meditation that searches through Martin’s past looking for answers about why he is the way he is, while also examining the role suicide has played in our culture for centuries, how it has evolved, and how philosophers have examined it.” —Esquire

“A rock for people who’ve been troubled by suicidal ideation, or have someone in their lives who is.” —The New York Times

“If you’re going to write a book about suicide, you have to be willing to say the true things, the scary things, the humiliating things. Because everybody who is being honest with themselves knows at least a little bit about the subject. If you lie or if you fudge, the reader will know.”

The last time Clancy Martin tried to kill himself was in his basement with a dog leash. It was one of over ten attempts throughout the course of his life. But he didn’t die, and like many who consider taking their own lives, he hid the attempt from his wife, family, coworkers, and students, slipping back into his daily life with a hoarse voice, a raw neck, and series of vague explanations.

In How Not to Kill Yourself, Martin chronicles his multiple suicide attempts in an intimate depiction of the mindset of someone obsessed with self-destruction. He argues that, for the vast majority of suicides, an attempt does not just come out of the blue, nor is it merely a violent reaction to a particular crisis or failure, but is the culmination of a host of long-standing issues. He also looks at the thinking of a number of great writers who have attempted suicide and detailed their experiences (such as David Foster Wallace, Yiyun Li, Akutagawa, Nelly Arcan, and others), at what the history of philosophy has to say both for and against suicide, and at the experiences of those who have reached out to him across the years to share their own struggles.

The result combines memoir with critical inquiry to powerfully give voice to what for many has long been incomprehensible, while showing those presently grappling with suicidal thoughts that they are not alone, and that the desire to kill oneself—like other self-destructive desires—is almost always temporary and avoidable.

A Note to the Reader • xi
Preface • xiii
 
Part I SUICIDAL TENDENCIES
1 The Suicidal Mind • 3
2 Is There a Death Drive? • 34
3 I Can Always Just Kill Myself Tomorrow • 59
4 They Fuck You Up / Your Mum and Dad (Part I) • 90
 
Part II ONE FOOT IN THE GRAVE
5 Drinking Myself to Death • 113
6 Philosophical Suicide • 156
7 The Sickness unto Death: Observations from Édouard Levé, David Foster Wallace, and Nelly Arcan • 192
8 The Afterlife, or, Welcome to the Psych Ward • 223
 
Part III THE LONG ROAD BACK
9 Relapse Is Part of Recovery • 249
10 They Fuck You Up / Your Mum and Dad (Part II) • 263
11 A Good Death? • 286
 
Acknowledgments • 335
Appendix I. Tools for Crisis • 337
Appendix II. In Case of Emergency: Interviews on Staying Alive • 341
Notes • 367
Index • 409

Praise for HOW NOT TO KILL YOURSELF

A Finalist for the Kirkus Prize for Nonfiction

One of The New York Times Book Review’s Critics’ Picks
One of the Boston Globe’s 55 Books We Loved this Year
One of Kirkus's Best Nonfiction Books of The Year
One of TIME’s 100 Must-Read Books of the Year

A New York Times Book Review Editor’s Choice
One of the New York Times’ 9 New Books We Recommend This Week
A Publisher’s Weekly Book of the Week
One of The Millions’ Most Anticipated Books of the Year
One of Lit Hub’s Most Anticipated Books of the Year

“Sui generis . . . a blunt and bracing read . . . as cogent and (yes) rational an account of the mind existing in the shadow of its own self-destruction as I have read . . . For all [Martin’s] focus on suicidal trauma, he is, most fundamentally, trying to write his way out from under it, to create a book not of death but of life.”
—David Ulin, The Atlantic

“I can see [this book] becoming a rock for people who’ve been troubled by suicidal ideation, or have someone in their lives who is, and want to understand the mentality, which can seem utterly mystifying to the unafflicted. Swirling with anguish and argument, tempered by practicality, it airs an often taboo topic with the authority of someone writing what he knows — all too gruesomely well.”
—The New York Times

“Candid and at times haunting . . . an urgent call to reframe how we think about suicide and those who struggle with self-destructive thoughts. Martin is never afraid, delving into his most vulnerable moments in detail to humanize a subject that so many are not able to openly discuss. In doing so, Martin crafts a captivating argument about suffering and survival.
—TIME, “The 100 Must-Read Books of 2023”

“Idiosyncratic, beautiful, and studded with caveats: sometimes this trick won’t work, Martin concedes, and sometimes this other one won’t, either. Even he doesn’t always follow his own advice. It’s an admission of sorts—that so much great literature can be read, that so much work can be done, but that another day to survive is always approaching. The work of choosing to not kill yourself isn’t the act of making that choice one time but making it over and over again.”
—The New Yorker

“There’s no sugarcoating or attempts at the salacious. It’s a deep meditation that searches through Martin’s past looking for answers about why he is the way he is, while also examining the role suicide has played in our culture for centuries, how it has evolved, and how philosophers have examined it.”
—Esquire

"Compelling . . . I admire this book, admire what it wants to do and be.”
—The Washington Post

“One of the more remarkable and lucid explorations of the human instinct for self-annihilation I've encountered since Walker Percy's thought experiments about people he termed ‘ex-suicides’ 40 years ago.”
— Arkansas Democrat Gazette

“A book called How Not to Kill Yourself is not only tough to read on the subway in hardcover, it also seems, at first blush, possibly dangerous for a depressed or suicidal person to read. But even as Martin spares no detail about his depressive episodes or suicide attempts, the book lives up to its ambitious title. Inherent to the hopeful message is Martin’s overarching philosophy that we as a society must eliminate the idea that suicidal or depressive or addictive people are bad or sinful, an idea that’s baked so deeply into our culture we may not even realize it’s there.”
—Emily Gould, Vulture/New York Magazine

“A remarkable book—self-flaying in its honesty, harrowing in its dark narrative turns, clear in its philosophizing, and ultimately consoling in its message of hope. Treating sometimes dangerous material with care, How Not to Kill Yourself is illuminating, riveting, and—for those of us who are suffering, or know people who are—potentially life-savingly helpful.”
—Scott Stossel, author of My Age of Anxiety

“The power and healing in How Not to Kill Yourself . . . is, I think, directly related to the compassion, vulnerability, and straight-up naked guts of author Clancy Martin. [His] offering of his own inner world and failed suicide attempts . . . is a profound service.”
—Lion’s Roar

“A riveting and inspiring read for anyone who has had to keep company with the chthonic feeling that the breath of life is a curse. Martin is one of the few members of the Socratic guild who is also a masterful writer of fiction. His knack for descriptions enables him to bring abstract concepts down to earth.”
— Los Angeles Review of Books

“Offers good counsel and advice, suggesting various ways to cope with self-defeat.”
—The New York Sun

“Thankfully, readers will find hope here in the midst of despair, and the loud message that you are not ever entirely alone.”
—Eureka Springs Times-Echo

 “Th[e] tone—bluntly direct and deeply human—characterizes this remarkable volume, an attempt to bring discussion of suicide out of the shadows so that we can better understand the powerful impulse to kill oneself and how we might circumvent it.. . . It’s not an easy book to read, but it’s an urgently important one.”
—Kirkus

“Feels vitally important because it goes deeply into a conversation about mental health so few of us ever have.”
—Vulture, “8 Great Audiobooks to Listen to This Month”

“Transfixing. . . This provocative dive into a difficult subject shouldn’t be missed.”
—Publishers Weekly, starred review

“[I] found myself both shocked and captivated by [Martin’s] story. . . . How Not to Kill Yourself is in part a memoir . . . But more than that, it’s a primer on literature about suicide, an investigation into whether there is such a thing as a “death drive” and a deeply empathetic advice book for people considering suicide and those who love them.”
—Los Angeles Times

“It had me rapt. It seems rare to see an unambiguously life-affirming book from someone who's been to such dark places.”
—Tao Lin, author of Leave Society

“Disquieting, deeply felt, eye-opening, and revelatory.”
—Kirkus Reviews, starred review

“Written with surprising tenderness and humor, this memoir-cum-critical-inquiry is a perspective-shifting study.”
—The Millions

“A critical memoir diving headfirst into our darkest and most taboo desire.”
—Lit Hub

“Clancy Martin has written an extraordinary, thoughtful book that combines his heartbreaking experience with clear-eyed suggestions. I don’t think I’ve ever read anything quite like it. Required—and, yes, somehow optimistic reading—for anyone interested in this enormous mental health problem.”
— D.T. Max, author of Every Love Story is a Ghost Story: The Life of David Foster Wallace

“In this unusually brave book, Clancy Martin dissects the anatomy of his own suicide attempts and, deploying other people’s stories and a wide range of literary sources, gives voice to the large questions that suicide raises: why some people want to live and others do not; why some fluctuate between the poles; why he is grateful to have survived his attempts but still hears the siren call of self-annihilation.  He writes confidently, philosophically, dramatically, and with great clarity about a life that has been both wondrous and agonizing.”
—Andrew Solomon, author of The Noonday Demon

“Suicide is impossibly difficult to understand but Clancy Martin gives first-person insight into why some choose to kill themselves; importantly, he also gives witness to the kind of hard work it takes for a suicidal person to opt for life.”
—Kay Redfield Jamison, author of An Unquiet Mind and Fires in the Dark

“The most honest, complicit, searing, and discomfiting book I’ve ever read about suicide (and I’ve read quite a few—out of purely scholarly interest, of course). All great narratives pose a battle between the force of life and the force of death; How Not To Kill Yourself does this as brilliantly and powerfully as any book I have encountered in quite some time. Thrilling and useful.”
—David Shields, author of The Thing About Life Is That One Day You'll Be Dead

“How Not to Kill Yourself is devastating and encyclopedic. Martin offers his own story, full of dangerous challenges and surprising lessons, and gives the reader many ways to think about suicide—the problem in literature, the problem in history, the problem in daily life.”
—Donald Antrim, author of One Friday in April: A Story of Suicide and Survival

“Clancy Martin reminds us that the most existential questions around suicide—what drives a person to want to die and what has kept them alive—are not answered by the act itself but by people like him, who have long suffered and are authentically seeking what it means to go on living. He fearlessly and relentlessly asks these questions of himself and is thankfully here today to offer his many valuable lessons, both for those who are struggling with thoughts of suicide and those who work to help them.”
—Dr. John S. Draper, Former Project Director of the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline network

“The book is both helpful and harrowing, asking readers to do what Martin says, not what he has done.”
—Publishers Weekly, “Clancy Martin Explains ‘How Not to Kill Yourself’