Released on: March 8, 2008, 11:51 am

Press Release Author: Arbor Books

Industry:

Press Release Summary: Hollywood actors and musicians seem to possess everything
most people secretly desire: fame, wealth, adoration, the list goes on. So where do
celebrities go wrong?


Press Release Body: (OAK RIDGE, NJ)-"For every self-destructive Hollywood star who
has died a sad, unexpected, early death due to drugs and alcohol, there are hundreds
of other celebrities who carry on with their dysfunctional, conflict-ridden lives,"
says Stephen Della Valle, author of the new book Rising Above the Influence and
president of the board at Turning Point rehabilitation center.

"The media has turned celebrity alcohol and drug addiction into entertainment, a
spectacle, rather than focusing on the life-and-death aspects of this serious
disease," he notes.

Mr. Della Valle is all too familiar with the lifestyle so many celebrities expose
themselves to on a daily basis. After twenty-plus years of drug use and alcoholism,
he finally made his way into a recovery program that succeeded in helping him
overcome his addiction issues-but it took losing his job, his family and himself to
get him to that point.

"People need to recognize the severity of this disease," he says. "Hollywood is
continuing to depict drug and alcohol use as 'cool,' and it's quickly becoming a
nationwide epidemic. With addiction, there are only three possible end
results-rehab, jail or death."

Mr. Della Valle considers himself one of the lucky ones. In Rising Above the
Influence, he candidly recounts his indoctrination into the world of substance abuse
as a young teenager and the desperate, sometimes morbidly comical situations he
endured to support his heavy addictions to heroin, prescription drugs, cocaine and
alcohol.

"I did a lot of things I'm not proud of," he says now. "There is nothing cool or
admirable about being an addict, no matter how much the media tries to make it look
that way."

Stephen Della Valle is president of the board of directors at Turning Point
rehabilitation center in Verona, New Jersey. Currently celebrating twenty years of
sobriety, he lives in Oak Ridge, New Jersey, with his wife, Donna. He has three
children.

Rising Above the Influence is available now (ISBN: 0-9801776-0-X; softcover; Oak
Ridge Press) on Amazon.com, Borders.com, BarnesandNoble.com, and at fine bookstores
everywhere.





Web Site: http://arborbooks.com

Contact Details: Arbor Books
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