A Stunning New Memoir
I wasn’t planning on starting a new book this week.
Certainly not this particular week, the very week my high school senior’s college applications are due and my work to-do list is so long I want to cry, not to mention I’m on high alert in case I need to go pick up my college student because of you-know-who now doing you-know-what in Maine. And I certainly wasn’t planning on finishing said new book in just one week, but. . .
Last Saturday morning, while slow-sipping my coffee and trying to make sense of this soul-transformation thing I’m going through, I heard a still, small voice, a soul-whisper if you will, sweetly reminding me that I promised myself I would read a certain new memoir I heard about last fall, asking me whether I’ve just been too afraid to start it and therefore avoiding it, and telling me it’s high time I stopped being so afraid and just read it.
So, I cashed in a Libro.fm credit right that very moment (before l lost my courage), strapped on my snowshoes, headed out to the woods, popped in my earbuds, hit play, and started chapter one of the audio version.
I didn’t think I would like this book.
I didn’t think I could go through with reading the whole thing.
I thought it would be too painful, too close to my own story, too much of a reminder of who I once wanted to be so badly, the person I left behind when my husband and I resigned from church leadership and left our old lives back in 2012.
I thought I would abandon it after the first chapter.
Instead, I LOVED it.
I know it’s a bit early to claim that I’ve found my favorite read of the year, but this new memoir surprised, delighted, and healed me so deeply that it’s certainly a candidate.
It’s Awake by Jen Hatmaker ⤵
First of all, let me admit that I don’t know Jen Hatmaker personally and I don’t know her work very well either. Mostly because when she was at the height of her career as a “Christian writer” (before conservative Christianity threw her out), I had already thrown myself out of that world and was deeply swept up in traveling full-time with my family, finding my way to healing and wholeness in other spaces and never came back into those circles.
But in early 2021, mostly while researching how to overcome my programming and biases, I heard rumblings about her starting to lead social justice conversations, overcoming a controversy, and dealing with attacks. And I read a few chapters of her most famous book For the Love a few months later.
So, I knew enough to know that this new memoir would most likely contain story after story about religion, particularly Southern Baptist religion (that’s why I’ve been avoiding it). What I didn’t expect was that she would cover so many other important topics as well, like ⤵
Grief
Patriarchy
Gender roles
Codependency
Long-term marriage
Financial responsibility
Racism
Cognitive dissidence
Anxiety
Collective trauma
The coward's fictional middle ground
Authentic friendship
Loyalty
Accountability
Otherness
Parenting teenagers and adults
Standing up to toxic church culture
Recovery
Redemption
Reclamation
I also wasn’t expecting her to cover these topics with so much grace, candor, healing, joy, and curse words. I loved it.
And oh my goodness, the way she talks about what it felt like coming to Maine for the first time — that’s exactly how it felt for me, too (a feeling I’ll never forget, and probably 99% of why my little family couldn’t stop coming back and eventually made our home here in Maine again and again).
I think I might love this new version of Jen Hatmaker. She seems like someone I’d love to have over to my place for a coffee chat.
Because here’s the thing — when you encounter someone who has lived the life your former self dreamed of living (church planter, spiritual leader, famous writer, etc) and she has lessons to share from the trenches, you listen.
I’m listening — and learning so much.
Which makes me have so much gratitude for the little soul-whisper that visited me last Saturday morning and asked me to read Awake — and so much gratitude to myself for saying yes.
💛
It makes me wonder, what is your soul whispering today, my friend? Is there a book you’ve been putting off reading, because maybe you’re afraid, but you know it’s time?
If it happens to be Awake by Jen Hatmaker, might I suggest the the audio version? The narration is impeccable, and it has loads of extras, including snippets of voice notes from Jen’s friends and family members, one of which is from her dad and made me ugly-cry like a baby.
If it’s something else and you feel like sharing, please do. I’m here and I LOVE chatting about books.
Sending love,
💛
Celeste
did AI write this? nope, this lady did ⤴ always💛