Debra Lieberman

Reasons to Believe Debra Lieberman

Reasons to Believe is the sad, funny, twisted, tragic and ultimately inspirational story of twenty-three year old Jimi Avery, who longs to be a poet but is trapped by her addiction to alcohol and drugs and her seemingly bottomless capacity for self-destruction. After her beloved father dies, she begins a rollercoaster ride through discovery and desolation, love and loss, reality and pipe dreams. During the course of the novel, she tries and fails several times to give up alcohol and drugs, with progressively more painful consequences. Finally, with the help of an old friend of her father's and a young girl she takes under her wing, Jimi becomes willing to let go of her boyfriend Angelo and everything else that holds her back from life's joy and beauty. She extricates herself from the web of her childhood traumas and finds hope, both in herself and the world outside. Ultimatley, she propels that hope into a workable sobriety. Jimi's story is a fictional memoir, filled with tears and laughter as she trudges haltingly along the bumpy road to recovery.