If you liked The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls, you're going to love Gail Brenner Nastasia's memoir, The Fruit You'll Never See.

Now a criminal defense attorney in Massachusetts, Nastasia grew up in the fishing town of Gloucester, Mass. where she was introduced at a very young age to the underbelly of adult addictions and perversions.

Growing up in a family riddled by mental illness and drug addiction, Gail experienced her childhood trauma as "normal" -- as it was all she knew. In exquisitely honest detail, Gail shares her history of abuse without anger or blame. In fact, she refuses to see the people who subjected her to abuse as bad. They are, she believes, also the victims of their circumstances.

Please take a listen to this episode, sisters. For one thing, it's a master class in forgiveness, hope, healing, and moving on.

For another, it is, sadly, the very last episode of Sisters Cracking Up.

We have spent the last 5 years joyfully interviewing the most incredible of guests who have taught us so much. And we will miss you, our wonderful sisters, who listened in and helped make Sisters Cracking Up the success it is.

Thank you, thank you, thank you. A million times over.

Signing off with love,
Abby and Julie

Sisters, if you've ever wondered if you might be a perfectionist, chances are you may be. And, according to author Katherine Morgan Schafler, that's more than okay.

Schafler, author of The Perfectionist's Guide to Losing Control: A Path ot Peace and Power, encourages us to look at perfectionism in a more positive light and to discard the pathologizing of it. You can be a perfectionist and, yes, you can be happy!

Schafler explains there isn't just one way to be a perfectionist and identifies 5 different types: Intense, Classic, Parisian, Procrastinator, and Messy. (Both Abby and Julie admit to being the Messy Type!)

In Schafler's own words, "Perfectionism invites a deep, unending exploration of who you are and what you most desire from this life." We couldn't agree more.

As the youngest daughter of crime boss Vincent "Chin" Gigante, Rita Gigante has a unique perspective on mob life. Her dad was the notorious leader of the Genovese crime clan and head of all five New York mob families for decades. Chin Gigante is often remembered for strolling the streets of New York City in his bathrobe, feigning mental illness in an attempt to distract the FBI from his underworld activities.

In our interview, Rita (the author of The Godfather's Daughter: An Unlikely Story of Love, Healing, and Redemption), talks openly, painfully, and lovingly about growing up in a family steeped in secrets and lies.

Whether you're interested in mafia life, organized crime, Vincent Gigante and his legacy, or simply in what it means to have grown up in a family like hers, our interview wtih Rita Gigante will not disappoint.

This is, most importantly, Rita's story: how she went from a family of origin that lived in darkness to a healer who lives in the light of acceptance, redemption and forgiveness.