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mikolee's review against another edition
1.0
Quirky autobiography of woman dealing with a divorce from her verbally abusive bipolar husband. She finally gives up trying to save the marriage after seeing her husbands emails on gay.com. Wasn't as funny as I wanted it to be and actually took me a few days to get through.
cathyofcary's review against another edition
3.0
I thought the writer went home to one of those old-order Mennonite farming villages to recover -- her parents were actually pretty modern. Nonetheless, it's a neat book. Some slow spots, a couple of jerky transitions but a great mother-daughter read. She does an intelligent, and at times funny, look at how the conservative lifestyle she fled shaped her for better and worse. Oh, for anyone who isn't (or is) into books about smart woman making dumb choices -- her husband didn't just turn out to be gay (as it says on the back of the book), he was emotionally abusive.
jennyisreading's review against another edition
3.0
A funny book, with an endearing narrator. The stories about the author’s mother were alone well worth the read.
alytodd's review against another edition
2.0
I picked up this book after one of my favorite authors, Jen Lancaster, recommended it in her blog. I was quite disappointed. i like my memoirs to be witting and fun, and this was neither for me.
eyegee's review against another edition
4.0
I listened to this book. It took me a while to "get" the tone of the narrator, which initially sounded so flippant that I wasn't taking the book seriously and nearly stopped during the first chapter. I'm glad I kept going. It's an interesting memoir of growing up in a Mennonite household, distancing herself from it as an adult, and returning after the breakup of her marriage. Coincidentally, I was reading Swing Low by Miriam Toews at the same time, and she too grew up in a small Mennonite community and left it. Though I suspect Miriam was much more of an outsider from girlhood, they both share a similar perspective on the positives and negatives of their upbringing.
madeleinelux's review against another edition
5.0
She is VERY funny, and I loved the way she talked about her mom.
Beyond that, life, you know? She talks the real stuff, and has an honest voice. It's a lovely read.
Beyond that, life, you know? She talks the real stuff, and has an honest voice. It's a lovely read.
kbbtad's review against another edition
2.0
There were some interesting insights into family dynamics, especially If you were raised Mennonite. However, it got too bogged down in derail.
lil's review against another edition
1.0
DNF (Did Not Finish). I didn't hate it, I just couldn't find a compelling reason to continue reading. I was bored. In fact, I fell asleep twice while trying to read it. There are way too many books out there that I don't want to waste my time. Glad I checked it out of the library. Good luck to future readers.
anali_n_m's review against another edition
3.0
Sometimes funny. I could relate to some of her tales of Mennonite-hood, though I was raised in a MUCH less conservative tradition. But overall, I was uncomfortable about how cruelly she portrayed her family and friends. Blunt, but caustic almost. I just thought, if it was me being written about, I would hate for the world to see me that way. I've also heard she stretched the truth? Not surprising, but still... Oh well, I hear the book after this one was redeeming. We'll see if that means I'll actually read it...
lizbarr's review against another edition
2.0
In which the author, after her marriage ends and she suffers a serious car accident, goes home to her parents, members of the conservative Mennonite community.
It probably says something about my upbringing that I was really struck by the lack of abuse in this book. Actually, no, that’s not true — Janzen’s account of her time with her family also unfolds, slowly, the abuse she suffered at the hands of her husband — but the only terrible things her conservative! religious! family did to her involved making her wear nerdy clothes, and sending her out into the world with no sense of self-preservation against predators.
I was slightly disappointed that Janzen’s family aren’t the conservative Mennonites of the kind I saw in Canada. Her parents had that lifestyle growing up, but were liberal enough to own a car and a modern house. And her mother had a nursing career. (By the time Jenzen returns, they’re so liberal her mother asks why she’s not showing off her legs in attractive shorts at a Mennonite gathering.) But if you’re coming into this book hoping for a look at the lifestyle of the very conservative and technology-rejecting, you’re going to be disappointed. We only get glimpses of that.
On the other hand, Janzen has an amazing ear for dialogue, and every character has a distinctive voice that feels very real. And her observations about the Mennonite church, German-American-Canadian culture, and growing up in an eccentric and loving family are really fun to read.
There’s another book in here, though, which is about Janzen coming to terms with her marriage. At first she seems to have come out of a relatively normal marriage that ended when her husband left her for a man he met on the internet. Then, in a trickle, we learn more about his abuse, his refusal to hold a job (because it would interfere with his creativity), his financial exploitation, threats of violence, etc. Janzen seems at times a little too preoccupied with her husband’s sexuality and his new partner’s penis, but it’s very clear this book was written while she was still processing and coming to terms with everything. The story is told in a very light, breezy, funny style, so it comes as a shock when her ex almost attacks her when she turns up for a court appearance (and he subpoenaed her!), and her lawyer advises her to hide in the bathroom after the hearing, so he doesn’t have a chance to attack her.
The two books don’t quite sit together properly, even united by Janzen’s distinctive voice. I enjoyed Mennonite in a Little Black Dress, but don’t feel compelled to read the follow-up.
It probably says something about my upbringing that I was really struck by the lack of abuse in this book. Actually, no, that’s not true — Janzen’s account of her time with her family also unfolds, slowly, the abuse she suffered at the hands of her husband — but the only terrible things her conservative! religious! family did to her involved making her wear nerdy clothes, and sending her out into the world with no sense of self-preservation against predators.
I was slightly disappointed that Janzen’s family aren’t the conservative Mennonites of the kind I saw in Canada. Her parents had that lifestyle growing up, but were liberal enough to own a car and a modern house. And her mother had a nursing career. (By the time Jenzen returns, they’re so liberal her mother asks why she’s not showing off her legs in attractive shorts at a Mennonite gathering.) But if you’re coming into this book hoping for a look at the lifestyle of the very conservative and technology-rejecting, you’re going to be disappointed. We only get glimpses of that.
On the other hand, Janzen has an amazing ear for dialogue, and every character has a distinctive voice that feels very real. And her observations about the Mennonite church, German-American-Canadian culture, and growing up in an eccentric and loving family are really fun to read.
There’s another book in here, though, which is about Janzen coming to terms with her marriage. At first she seems to have come out of a relatively normal marriage that ended when her husband left her for a man he met on the internet. Then, in a trickle, we learn more about his abuse, his refusal to hold a job (because it would interfere with his creativity), his financial exploitation, threats of violence, etc. Janzen seems at times a little too preoccupied with her husband’s sexuality and his new partner’s penis, but it’s very clear this book was written while she was still processing and coming to terms with everything. The story is told in a very light, breezy, funny style, so it comes as a shock when her ex almost attacks her when she turns up for a court appearance (and he subpoenaed her!), and her lawyer advises her to hide in the bathroom after the hearing, so he doesn’t have a chance to attack her.
The two books don’t quite sit together properly, even united by Janzen’s distinctive voice. I enjoyed Mennonite in a Little Black Dress, but don’t feel compelled to read the follow-up.