I admire you and your love for self-help books. I have my own stack of them and Codependent No More is in there. From what I've researched that author, Melody Beattie, defined codependency for the world and made it an issue that no one really talked about before her writing. She also has a book called "The Language of Letting Go" and it's daily excerpts from her writing, I find it very encouraging.

I agree that they don't push you too hard and I also think they are a lot like therapists in the directions / exercises they give. To me, it's like what you put in is what you get out.

If I may ask, what bothers your BF about self-help books?