How I came to write a biography of Bill Wilson (2004)

About five years ago Time Magazine asked me to write a profile of Wilson, the cofounder of Alcoholics Anonymous. I was amazed to find that although there had been some books about Wilson including his own and his wife Lois' autobiographies, there had never been a proper, fully documented biography. Bill Wilson is one of the most influential thinkers of the 20th century, a man who founded a movement which changed all of our lives. I felt he deserved the best biography I could write. I began the book respecting him as a teacher and a writer. By the time I finished that respect had doubled and redoubled. I hope that my book does justice to this extraordinary man and gives some sense of his amazing life story.