Reviews tagging 'Animal cruelty'

Sex Cult Nun: Breaking Away from the Children of God, a Wild, Radical Religious Cult by Faith Jones

6 reviews

playswithstring's review

challenging dark emotional inspiring reflective sad tense medium-paced

4.0

This book was tough. It’s hundreds of pages of abuse. I knew what the Children of God cult was about after reading Uncultured (Daniella Mestyanek) last year, but Faith Jones goes so much more into detail about the abuse she suffered. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Emotional abuse, Gaslighting, Abandonment, Rape, Adult/minor relationship, Incest, Misogyny, Pedophilia, Religious bigotry, and Sexual assault

Moderate: Alcohol

Minor: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Deportation, Eating disorder, Abortion, Addiction, Alcoholism, Fatphobia, Grief, Infidelity, Medical content, Body shaming, Drug use, Drug abuse, and Physical abuse

cailyne's review against another edition

Had to DNF this one - it threw me into a slump and I was actively avoiding reading just to not have to come back to it. Faith’s story is important, but I wasn’t ready for the graphic detailed accounts. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Domestic abuse, and Sexual assault

Minor: Animal cruelty and Animal death

sara_m_martins's review

This book is far too graphic in the abuse described. 
Plus, the writing style and the form feel weird and dissonant, as the sequence of events goes from pages of different but relatively-mundane life (like building a wall) to extremely abusive and traumatic scenarios. 
Additionally, I think I would rather read a more removed perspective - i.e. a biography instead of an autobiography

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Colonisation, Confinement, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Animal cruelty, Self harm, Sexual content, Infidelity, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Pregnancy, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual harassment, Trafficking, Abandonment, Adult/minor relationship, Excrement, Incest, Animal death, Child abuse, Misogyny, Mental illness, Rape, Religious bigotry, Toxic relationship, Sexual violence, and Violence

Minor: Addiction, Animal cruelty, Bullying, Alcoholism, Cultural appropriation, and Drug use

ramreadsagain's review against another edition

challenging dark hopeful sad medium-paced

I have decided to not give star ratings to nonfiction memoirs.

This was a rollercoaster of hard hitting scenes of child abuse one after the other, so please be warned that this is not an easy read/listen. 

I hadn’t heard of this cult before so this was also a very informative book for me. Faith does an amazing job at portraying how members are manipulated into believing that they are doing the right thing and how difficult it can be to break free. 

It ends with some excellent thoughts on the importance of examining your beliefs, no matter what those are, as well as some emotional passages about self-ownership. 

A good yet harrowing read, absolutely would recommend. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual assault, Child abuse, Religious bigotry, Adult/minor relationship, and Emotional abuse

Moderate: Pedophilia, Death, Toxic relationship, and Rape

Minor: Animal death, Sexual content, and Animal cruelty

metalmakubex's review against another edition

challenging emotional informative reflective sad tense medium-paced

4.0

So right off the bat, I do want to mention to please look into trigger warnings for this book if you are interested in reading it. This is a heavy topic told from a very insider perspective, and does not pull punches.
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To say I “enjoyed” this memoir is not the correct word for it. However, it was very informative, and Faith was an interesting narrator. We follow her cult indoctrination from a very young age, and the way she tells the story in a present tense was an intriguing and haunting choice. While I’ve seen some people put off by that, but for me, it made her story all the more immersive. It may have made a difference for me since I listened to it in audiobook. Her writing style is very blunt and simple. She would mention her abuse as if she was describing what she ate for breakfast. It well portrayed the mindset she was in at the time, her belief that her experience was the “true” path and to be expected. It set alarm bells off in my head and made me wish I could rescue young Faith myself.⁠
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I also liked how she chose to write her parents’ experiences in the novel as well. In particular, her mother’s struggle with following their beliefs, and how Faith had to become a parental figure for her siblings because of it, was heartbreaking. Her parents were not perfect people, but Faith was able to write them with humanity and understanding, despite their mistakes and misgivings.⁠
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I would recommend this to anyone interested in personal accounts from ex-cult members, or if you’ve ever wondered “how does one even get wrapped up in a cult the first place?” Be wary of reading it if you are sensitive to certain material. Viewer discretion is advised.⁠

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Child abuse, and Sexual assault

Moderate: Racism and Xenophobia

thelassinlinen's review

challenging dark emotional informative sad tense medium-paced

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Abandonment, Addiction, Adult/minor relationship, Alcoholism, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Antisemitism, Biphobia, Body shaming, Bullying, Child abuse, Colonisation, Confinement, Cultural appropriation, Domestic abuse, Eating disorder, Emotional abuse, Forced institutionalization, Gaslighting, Hate crime, Homophobia, Incest, Infidelity, Kidnapping, Medical content, Mental illness, Misogyny, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Pregnancy, Rape, Religious bigotry, Self harm, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual harassment, Sexual violence, Slavery, Stalking, Toxic relationship, Trafficking, and Xenophobia