It was a cocktail of chaos, trauma and love that gave rise to the bestselling memoir “Lit.” This is the third memoir written by poet and educator Mary Karr. You are propelled poetically through his life, stopping and sipping moment after moment which leads to inevitable full-blown alcoholism. The first two books are confusingly remembered. Mary's traumatic childhood is the focus of her first book and is continued by her attempts to erase it all, as a wild young adult in the second. In the third book, “Bed,” Mary focuses directly on the moments that led to her addiction and recovery; with both his drink and his mother. A serially married mother, artist, alcoholic; and spent time in a mental institution for attempting to murder Mary and her sister. No matter how hard she tries, Mary cannot become his mother; a role she sinks into once she becomes a mother herself (Karr, 2010 p. 33). After years of drinking, several attempts at recovery, an empty marriage and time spent in an institution for attempting suicide, Mary finds sobriety and frees herself from the paradigms arranged by her parents. She finds the strength to rewrite her heredity with a touch of peer support and prayer. Despite a lifetime of therapy and recovery, it is not until Mary “lets go” and accepts God and the priest that she finally learns to heal and truly recover. . His childhood was devoid of any religious affiliation and structure. Mary's father was an atheist and her mother gravitated toward different religious fads and organizations. The first account of Mary praying is when her mother dropped her off at college and gave her the experience of her first loss of consciousness. She remembers...... middle of paper...... Ry's soul. I too can't understand why we as a culture celebrate people who recover? I think it's a great and wonderful thing to have your life back, even though we idolize them, we make them martyrs in a way. I would much rather read and honor those people who never gave in to temptation, who never drank or got high and destroyed lives. Although I enjoyed reading this book and will likely read more of his writings, this book is a great way to read and understand how paradigm maps can be created and influenced, but also modified and rewritten. The best part of this story is the understanding of hope. No matter what life or heredity has dealt you, you have the power to change. ReferenceCovey, SR (1989). The 7 habits of highly effective people. New York, NY: Free Press. Karr, M. (2010). Lit: A memoir. New York, NY: Harper Perennial.