Where is your nonfiction section please.
Quite the mixed bag today, eh? Although I try to avoid hard reading goals or challenges, I do set myself a soft challenge of reading at least one big book of Russian history every year. It's one of my favorite genres anyway and there are so many that it's a good way to make sure... Continue Reading →
Book review: Beyond Belief, by Jenna Miscavige Hill (Amazon / Book Depository) As Scientologists, we believed that when our current body died, the spirit inside it would begin a new life in a new body. Our founder, L. Ron Hubbard, said that, as spirits, we had lived millions of years already, and we would continue... Continue Reading →
Book review: Unfollow, by Megan Phelps-Roper (Amazon / Book Depository) I was beginning to see that our first loyalty was not to the truth but to the church. That for us, the church was the truth, and disloyalty was the only sin unforgivable. This was the true Westboro legacy. Megan Phelps-Roper is the granddaughter of... Continue Reading →
Book review: Without a Prayer, by Susan Ashline (Amazon / Book Depository) Each year, Chadwicks had a Halloween parade, and families would line Oneida Street--except for the spot in front of the redbrick building. People from the church would chase them off the lawn. Though Oneida Street was a typical stream for trick-or-treaters, no one... Continue Reading →
Book review: Prophet's Prey, by Sam Brower (Amazon / Book Depository) Private investigator Sam Brower found something unusual in Ross Chatwin, a former member of the the insular Fundamentalist Church of Latter Day Saints (FLDS). Chatwin's case, and Brower's investigation into the religious sect that had excommunicated him, piqued his curiosity like no other investigation had.... Continue Reading →
I'm still working on compiling my favorites of 2018 booklist, but it's hard to focus on the past when 2019 has so much exciting new nonfiction on the way! Let's experience some Vorfreude (that wonderful German word describing the excitement of thinking about happiness to come) looking at some of 2019's upcoming releases in nonfiction. In... Continue Reading →
Book review: Sin, Shame & Secrets, by David Yonke On Holy Saturday in 1980, the day before Easter Sunday, elderly nun Sister Margaret Ann Pahl was found murdered in the sacristy of Mercy Hospital in Toledo, Ohio. She'd been strangled with an altar cloth and her body bore stab wounds in the shape of an... Continue Reading →
Book review: Apocalypse Child, by Flor Edwards Amazon I have no memory of my ancestry or record of my lineage; there is only Father David...When I picture my family tree, I see Mom...Dad...and my siblings - too many to count on two hands. When I envision my ancestors I see faraway Nordic countries where fjords... Continue Reading →
Book review: Escape, by Carolyn Jessop with Laura Palmer (Amazon / Book Depository) Instead of playing hide-and-seek as children, we played Apocalypse. When I saw that Rachel Jeffs, daughter of Warren Jeffs of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints was releasing a memoir, Breaking Free, I figured I should tackle some of the other FLDS memoirs I've... Continue Reading →
Book review: The Cult Next Door, by Elizabeth Burchard Amazon When cults make the news, it's often because they've done something awful on a compound somewhere, or in the jungles of Guyana. This memoir shows the mesmerizing power of a cult close to home, one that forms in the heart of a major metropolis, in one of Manhattan's poshest... Continue Reading →
Book review: In the Days of Rain, by Rebecca Stott "No one would guess that I was raised in a Christian fundamentalist cult or that my father and grandfather were ministering brothers in one of the most reclusive and savage Protestant sects in British history." Rebecca Stott is the daughter of Roger Stott, a minister turned defector... Continue Reading →
Book review: Sunshine State, by Sarah Gerard Sunshine State, up and coming literary darling Sarah Gerard's essay collection rooted in her childhood home state of Florida, hits some high highs and low lows. The opening essay, "BFF", starts the book out as strongly as it could possibly be started; I was hooked. Gerard dreamily, wistfully... Continue Reading →
What's Nonfiction? 