Did you know that the fluid in your spinal cord is the same color as lemonade? I sat and watched it drip from my little brother's limp body into a medical bag on his bedside, as one of his surgeons told us the news that nearly shredded my faith to chaff.

"This kid will never walk again."

These essays were written during the worst year of my life. I wrote them for one of my college classes, answering various prompts on the theme of place. I didn't know at the time that I was chronicling a fight for my existence.

My family and faith have never been about fitting in. We don't believe in God because of what they say at church. We see him in the mud that cakes our jeans and the laughter we share around the campfire, drinking beer and listening to the grisly stories our dad brings home from the ER. Our faith in God has never been about propriety; it's been about relationship.

How can you reconcile that kind of faith when it seems like God stands by as your whole world falls apart?

When my faith went up in flames, I found truth like I never had before. Sometimes God shatters you to shatter the lies you didn't know you believed, and there's nothing left to do but buck up and face what's right.

Faith is tested, hope victorious, and valuable lessons are learned along the way in this raw, wildly funny and inappropriate memoir.

If you're looking for a pat-answer, neat and tidy devotional about God's work when tragedy strikes, move on. O'Connor brilliantly captures the complexity of grief and faith in her gut-wrenching, hilarious, and beautiful telling of stories that have shaped her understanding of God's love.

Michelle Goodrich