Lacey read and liked Lee Anne's review of High On Arrival:

"If all the teen stars of my favorite childhood shows continue to write memoirs, I will continue to read them. Few will top this one, though. Mackenzie Phillips had a drug habit that makes Maureen McCormick's pretty severe cocaine addiction look down...more If all the teen stars of my favorite childhood shows continue to write memoirs, I will continue to read them. Few will top this one, though. Mackenzie Phillips had a drug habit that makes Maureen McCormick's pretty severe cocaine addiction look downright recreational.

Phillips has presented the seamier side of the happy hippie Laurel Canyon life (recently the topic of a pretty coffee table book I just skimmed). Five year olds wandering the beach unsupervised; junior high kids taking acid, snorting coke, and learning from their parents how to roll joints. Her father, Papa John Phillips, would go out of town and leave Mackenzie and her brother in the care of whomever was in his house at the time, or strand her at airports, or in London. His live-and-let-live, as long as it feels good, do it lifestyle was ultimately the death of him, and it goes a long way toward explaining the incestuous behavior that has been generating all the media controversy.

Mackenzie has taken some heat for these revelations, including denials from Michelle and Genevieve, her two step-mothers. Chynna and Bijou Phillips, John's other daughters, report no sexual attention from their father, which has fed the belief that Mackenzie is lying, and brought her condemnation--if she knew he was capable of this, why would she let her younger sisters live alone with John? But what the nay-sayers aren't taking into account are the facts that Mackenzie and John were working as peers at the time (touring as a Mamas & Papas reunion act), and more importantly, using drugs as peers also. These two facts excuse nothing, but explain a lot.

I hope that the fuss around this book doesn't endanger Mackenzie Phillips' fragile hold on sobriety. Good for her, for writing this book, which is gross and juicy and depressing and entertaining.(less) "