I commend you on your tenacity in getting through the book! ;) I started
reading it a while back, but soon decided I'd rather spend my time
reading something else.
If you haven't read it yet, there is a review of this book by her
brother-in-law, Boyd Petersen (who also wrote the Hugh Nibley
biography), that you might be interested in. It's available at
http://www.fairlds.org/FAIR_Reviews/Leaving%20the%20Saints_4.html
And here is a follow-up presentation he gave at the 2005 FAIR Conference:
http://www.fairlds.org/Reviews/Rvw200506.html
- Trevor
Marianne Hales Harding wrote:
> Well, I just finished reading Martha Beck's 2005 book "Leaving the
> Saints." Here in England the title reads "Leaving the Saints: One
> Child's Story of Survival and Hope" rather than "Leaving the Saints:
> How I Lost the Mormons and Found my Faith." It also has a picture of
> young child standing outside a door rather than the angel Moroni. It
> was interesting reading. I remember both loving and hating her book
> Expecting Adam. She had some lovely things to say, but often her
> final conclusions were baffling. I mean, it's like hearing someone
> say, "It is sunny outside, the kids are in school and I am eating
> lunch. Therefore, as any intelligent person can see, it is
> midnight." Huh? You had me up until your therefore. This book has a
> similar "huh?" quality. She describes both things that I have
> experienced and things that I have not. I should first clarify that I
> make no attempt to pass any judgement on whether or not her story of
> abuse happened. I have no idea. There's no way I could have any
> inkling on that part of her story. I do have to say, though, that her
> descriptions of things that I *have* experienced are so screwy that I
> am extremely skeptical when she starts describing things that I
> *haven't* experienced. For instance, I have been through the temple.
> I remember the newness, the awkwardness of putting on items of
> clothing I have no experience with etc. I have even experienced the
> "wrath" of an elderly temple worker. Reading her description of those
> events as they happened to her, though, is like watching a video with
> the focus out of whack. I can picture in my minds eye the things she
> is describing but the way she describes them is not in any way how I
> understand those things to be--like looking at a bright blue wall and
> having someone tell you it is pink. Also, I have actually had my hair
> cut from long to extremely (boy-cut) short in Provo, Utah and no one
> threatened to tattle on me to my husband or father. And when I did a
> search on "Sonia Johnson" in the BYU library I found her actual book
> resides there so it makes me a wee bit skeptical about her claim that
> the BYU library had exact-o knifed her every mention into oblivion.
> Guess the Conspiracy Theory Librarian who had that job isn't so
> talented at this sort of thing.
>
> I found the "huh?" factor to be quite strong every time she helpfully
> explained how things "are" in Mormonism. For instance, when she talks
> about going into emergency surgery and her mother balks at the idea of
> watching her kids ("I have to make dinner for your father") she
> helpfully explains, "In a Mormon context, what I'd just done was like
> calling the chef for the White House and asking him to rustle up some
> chicken nuggets for my rug rats while he was busy cooking for the
> president" (p 99). I'm not sure what sort of alternate world she
> lives in, but that in no way is *my* Mormon context. I guess I must
> have missed the Relief Society lesson that said that cooking your
> husband's dinner was more important than helping your daughter (or
> really *anyone*) who was having emergency surgery. It's just such a
> bizarre characterization of Mormonism. Certainly there are people
> within (and, actually, without) Mormonism for whom that would be
> true. But that isn't true of Mormonism in general. The book,
> unfortunately, is filled with these sorts of "helpful" summaries of
> what Mormonism "is" and what Mormons "believe."
>
> I feel for the author and the obvious mental suffering she has endured
> through the years. I have no idea what may or may not be the source
> of that suffering but there are enough holes in her book that I
> wouldn't look to her as a trusted source of information.
>
> Marianne Hales Harding
>
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