This is possibly the most difficult book to rate I've ever encountered. Because on one hand, it's a compelling cult escape memoir from a capable author who held a central role in a widely-known hate group. It's a page-turner for sure.
But on the other hand, while I can't fully grasp the unique struggles and wounds that come from living in a community so tightly knit and insular in thought and belief from the rest of the world, I don't feel as though the author has done enough through this book to acknowledge the harm and anguish that she has directly caused to countless marginalized people, or how she has profited, greatly and in an ongoing way, from that hatred.
I appreciate her ultimate message urging everyone to seek understanding and compassion, and to hold space for doubt. But I don't think that people should be expected to extend kindness to their oppressors. I don't like how her glowing descriptions of her family, purportedly in service of showing the complexity of much-maligned individuals, seem to rehabilitate the character of some of the most militantly anti-LGBTQ people of our generation. I don't appreciate how often and flippantly she uses the f-slur and the n-slur throughout the book, without so much as a warning or qualifier up front, just because that was language used around her home and in her protests. It frustrates me that she is presumably making a huge profit off of this book, which she was able to write because of her rise to prominence on Twitter as a primary mouthpiece for a hate group.
The author is certainly a victim of the WBC, but the amount of time she spends discussing her own victimhood (a lot) compared with the words she spares to acknowledge her own role in the suffering of others (a few raw moments) feels unsatisfactory to me. The journey I hoped I'd get from this story was Evil to Good. The journey we actually get is Mean (but so well-intentioned!) to Nice. And from a person who has gone on TV and to funerals and pride marches to say that God hates me..."nice" just isn't enough.
Graphic: Biphobia, Transphobia, Lesbophobia, Homophobia, Religious bigotry, Sexism, Misogyny, and Emotional abuse
Moderate: Racial slurs and Racism