Some events in our childhood can have a lifelong effect and can shape how we see ourselves and how we believe others see us. They can also influence the choices we make, and some of those choices can take us down a very dark path. In Beauty from My Ashes, Gloria Anderson takes us through the events of her life and the choices she made that resulted in the death of an innocent and almost her own. Her story shows us that though we may feel like our life is nothing but a heap of burned-up dreams and a pile of ashes from what could have been, there is hope to be found and beauty that can come from even the darkest and most devastated life.