Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time
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One of my top books of the year: a nuanced, thoughtful graphic novel portrayal of Joseph Smith’s life

Joseph Smith and the Mormons by Noah Van Sciver

December 2, 2022 by GentleRain Leave a Comment

One of my main special interest areas has always been high-control/niche religious groups. In the interest of review transparency, I do not believe in any of the LDS church’s claims and do not come from an LDS background at all, so this is not a review from a believing member. However, this book is not a hack job and I think you could read it as a member and not be too upset. Van Sciver was raised in the LDS Church and as he writes […]

Filed Under: Biography/Memoir Tagged With: graphic history, LDS Church, mormon history, Mormonism, Noah Van Sciver

GentleRain's CBR14 Review No:136 · Genres: Biography/Memoir · Tags: graphic history, LDS Church, mormon history, Mormonism, Noah Van Sciver ·
Rating:
· 0 Comments

Just Every Trigger Warning Imaginable

I'm Glad My Mom Died by Jeanette McCurdy

November 30, 2022 by GentleRain 2 Comments

I am too old to have watched Jeanette McCurdy on Nickelodeon, but I was vaguely aware of her before she started promoting this book. I also follow a lot of eating disorder recovery stuff, so I’d seen her podcast being suggested before this came out and was thus aware that the book was going to deal with her eating disorder a lot. Up front I will say that if you have an eating disorder and/or are in recovery from one, this book is super, super […]

Filed Under: Biography/Memoir Tagged With: child abuse, child star, cw: eating disorder, Jeanette McCurdy, Mormonism, mother daughter relationships

GentleRain's CBR14 Review No:135 · Genres: Biography/Memoir · Tags: child abuse, child star, cw: eating disorder, Jeanette McCurdy, Mormonism, mother daughter relationships ·
Rating:
· 2 Comments

“Conflicted” would have been a more accurate title

December 23, 2018 by Dusty Highway 2 Comments

Tara Westover’s memoir, Educated, is difficult to digest. She’s the youngest of seven children in a fundamentalist Mormon family in rural Idaho. Her father rules with the proverbial iron fist. He’s a survivalist, a millennialist, a conspiracy-theorist. He keeps his children out of school, refuses them medical care, continually places them in physical danger. Her mother resists in small ways but ultimately caves whenever the father demands her submission. One of her brothers educates himself well enough to get into BYU and encourages Tara to […]

Filed Under: Biography/Memoir Tagged With: #CBR10, #memoir, child abuse, Educated, Education, fundamentalist, misogyny, Mormonism, Religion, Tara Westover

Dusty Highway's CBR10 Review No:68 · Genres: Biography/Memoir · Tags: #CBR10, #memoir, child abuse, Educated, Education, fundamentalist, misogyny, Mormonism, Religion, Tara Westover ·
Rating:
· 2 Comments

Bigotry and fundamentalism make for a bad mix

March 20, 2018 by alwaysanswerb 3 Comments

I’m on the books as being a fan of Jon Krakauer, so as someone who is not very familiar with Mormonism beyond that South Park Episode, I was beyond curious to read his take on the history of Mormonism and the ways that certain ingrained aspects of the faith can somewhat naturally progress into the type of extremism that causes two brothers to brutally murder their sister in-law and her child because they believed they were following God’s orders. In general, one of the ways […]

Filed Under: History, Non-Fiction, Religion Tagged With: Jon Krakauer, Mormonism, Utah

alwaysanswerb's CBR10 Review No:16 · Genres: History, Non-Fiction, Religion · Tags: Jon Krakauer, Mormonism, Utah ·
Rating:
· 3 Comments

The Kind of Stuff They Don’t Teach You About At Church

April 12, 2017 by Lipton 4 Comments

“A Mormon has a right to believe what he will. His thoughts may be as free as the unconfined air, and his conscience should by no means be restrained by legal enactments. But his acts are quite a different thing.” -Raleigh News and Observer, July 20, 1881

Filed Under: History, Religion Tagged With: 19th Century history, American History, history, mormon history, Mormonism, patrick q. mason, religious history, the mormon menace, U.S. history

Lipton's CBR9 Review No:11 · Genres: History, Religion · Tags: 19th Century history, American History, history, mormon history, Mormonism, patrick q. mason, religious history, the mormon menace, U.S. history ·
Rating:
· 4 Comments

Religion makes some people kinda cray cray.

July 20, 2015 by Mrs Smith Reads 1 Comment

I had wanted to read Under the Banner of Heaven for quite a long time, and finally found a copy at my local used book store this year. I started and stopped reading several times, to pick up lighter, less gruesome novels, but I kept coming back to read this intense, true-crime novel, that is less about the horrible murder of a 24 year old mother and her 15 month old daughter (and it was violently and insanely horrible), as it is about a fundamentalist […]

Filed Under: Non-Fiction Tagged With: #polygamy, fundamentalism, Jon Krakauer, Mormonism, Mrs Smith Reads, Religion, Under the Banner of Heaven

Mrs Smith Reads's CBR7 Review No:8 · Genres: Non-Fiction · Tags: #polygamy, fundamentalism, Jon Krakauer, Mormonism, Mrs Smith Reads, Religion, Under the Banner of Heaven ·
Rating:
· 1 Comment


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