This book was a lifeline for me when I was drowning in a sea of deception, coercion, and abuse inside my home and inside the culture (the cult) that I had been born into and lived in for over 50 years.

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In her memoir, Martha Beck recounts her own personal journey out of her culture-of-origin (Mormonism) that started as a simple, sincere desire for real truth.

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One of my favorite quotes from the book that inspired me to continue on my own journey to freedom was, "No matter how difficult and painful it may be, nothing sounds as good to the soul as the truth."

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Martha's generosity in sharing the harsh realities of what it looks like to confront falsehoods and abuse, but still come out on the other side to a new and better life, is a gift I will always be grateful for.

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As I read her story, I saw my own reality - especially in her statement, "When the 'sensitive information' you carry is your own history, going mute to protect the system doesn't keep you from being destroyed; it just means that you destroy yourself."

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Martha's story inspired me to take a long, hard look at what was actually happening to me in the system I was in.  The fact that she had somehow managed to find her way out gave me the courage to do the same.

In this beautifully-written memoir, Sue Monk Kidd shares her story of healing the feminine wound inflicted by patriarchal religious traditions.

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The most impactful anecdote from the book for me was about an incident when she witnessed her teenage daughter being disrespected by two grown men, which she said was a wake-up call for her.  

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One of my favorite quotes from this book was, "There is a time to be gentle and a time to be fierce."

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Reading this book inspired me to fiercely pursue, fight for, and expect a much higher level of respect for all women.  It also helped me to understand that the Divine was definitely not confined to a male deity that had been written about by men for the purpose of controlling and subordinating women.

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My own daughter was in high school when I read this book, and it literally brought me to tears.  It also put a fire in my belly to start doing everything I could to try to change things for myself, for my daughter, for ALL the daughters!!!

Unless you've been living in a cave for the past 40 years, you've probably heard of this classic Margaret Atwood novel that was turned into a hugely-popular Hulu Original series.

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Most people consider this a haunting tale of dark, dystopian fiction.  What haunted me was the fact that many of the beliefs and practices laid out in the book mirrored my lived reality in American Evangelicalism.

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It was not a far reach to see how the culture I was living in could very easily turn into the harrowing nightmare found in Atwood's 'fictional' story.

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Reading this book (and watching the series) was like hearing a forecast of an impending disaster which would have cataclysmic results.

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To my great dismay, it now seems like this is the road that my nation is all-too-quickly marching down.

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One of my favorite quotes from this book is, "Ignoring isn't the same as ignorance, you have to work at it."

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It's way past time that we all stop ignoring and start heeding the warning laid out in this story and fight against the tyranny of misogynistic violence.