Reviews provided by Syndetics
Library Journal Review
Scorah, an essayist and editor for Scholastic, pens a debut chronicling her experiences as a Jehovah's Witness. The author describes her tumultuous beginnings, from an unstable home life with an alcoholic father to being ostracized as a teen for an inappropriate relationship. Along the way, she offers valuable insight into the psychosocial structure of Witness life. Scorah, influenced heavily by extended family pressure, fails to flee the institution and, instead, embraces its safety through a convenient marriage and travel to China as a missionary. Scorah finds Witnessing in China to be secretive and isolating, yet she thrives after finding employment as a podcaster. Her religious convictions falter after an involved online correspondence with a fan intensifies. Life unravels, and Scorah walks away from her loveless marriage and the Jehovah's Witnesses community, apologetically. The author's life slowly evolves, but not without further heartbreak. Scorah's closing pages fast forward to the unimaginable--the tragic death of her infant son and the pain of trying to find solace when one's faith has gone quiet. VERDICT A compelling story offering insight into the Jehovah's Witnesses, their mission work, and the hardships a former believer faces as an apostate.--Angela Forret, Clive, IA
Publishers Weekly Review
In her impressive debut, Scorah recounts her years as a Jehovah's Witness in China, her decision to leave the faith, and her ongoing spiritual questioning. In 2005, Scorah and her husband left Vancouver for Taipei before volunteering to move to Shanghai, where being a Jehovah's Witness could get them deported. There, they worked as English teachers and private tutors, covertly preaching their doctrines of impending apocalypse to Chinese citizens and expats they meet. Eventually, Scorah found a job working on a podcast, and through her work and interactions with a man she met online, she began to question her religion. After revealing the intimate friendship to her husband, Scorah decided she needed to leave him and was shunned by her family and friends. Scorah's prose is straightforward, and she has a winning sense of humor about how much she's changed: "We gave up any hope of a career all for the sake of saving these people, and goddammit-no pun intended-we were very concerned about their destruction." Scorah provides a rare glimpse into the insular world of the Jehovah's Witnesses, and her accounts of expat life and leaving her faith should give this candid memoir wide appeal. (June) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
Kirkus Book Review
Scorah, an editor at Scholastic, debuts with the story of her life in, and after, the Jehovah's Witnesses.Having been born into the church, the author went on to become one of its missionaries to China; the most fascinating portions of her memoir describe her years in Shanghai. Scorah paints the picture of an innocent and unquestioning young girl who grew up to be a more independent, yet socially impaired, adult. Following a protracted teenage tryst that caused her to be ostracized from the church for a time, she married a man she did not love and found escape and meaning as a missionary, reaching out to whomever she could find to teach Jehovah's Witness doctrine. The author is adept in her portrayals of the conflict in cultures she discovered in China and in relaying the challenges she faced as a Westerner trying to convert people in a foreign country. A lengthy online affair with a man who became driven to prove her religion wrong led Scorah to have doubts and eventually begin the process of leaving her husband and then the churchand thus most everything she had ever known. The author eventually found new work and friendships in Shanghai, and she later relocated to New York. Her work is well-written, and only occasionally does the author delve too heavy-handedly into salacious tell-all territory. Mostly, she provides an eye-opening account of how Jehovah's Witnesses live and operate. Sadly, the tale lacks a happy ending, as the author would lose her 4-month-old son. "When I arrived at lunch [at daycare] to nurse him, he was dead," she writes in the heartbreaking final section. "No one could tell me why, or what had happened." The narrative ends on a note of near-despair, with only a glimmer of hope. "I have called a truce with the unknown," writes Scorah, "and I am learning to live with the disquiet."An intriguing read about a mysterious religion. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.