While trying to make it as an actress, Bethany Joy Lenz was constantly searching for a place where she fit in. She eventually found it in a bible study group that slowly evolved into a cult environment. The Big House Family influenced the roles she took, her romantic relationships, and manipulated her into giving them thousands upon thousands of dollars.
This book offers almost zero One Tree Hill gossip, and for me that was a very good thing. Not that I don’t love a good teen soap BTS moment (especially when it’s a show I loved), but there are rewatch podcasts for that. This book caught and maintained my attention because it shared a truly unique experience that happened to be tangentially connected to the millennial zeitgeist. What I didn’t love is how Lenz stops just short of clarifying a few key aspects, namely her name and current status. She sort of calls herself Joy, intimating that Bethany or Bethany Joy was simply a stage name, but it wasn’t really clear. When you’re telling a personal story but fail to explain or even fully confirm your preferred name aka key identifier, it feels like perhaps we don’t know you. And the point of a memoir to know you. Similarly, I was hoping for a slightly more detailed where-are-they-now moment at the end. Overall, though, I’m so intrigued by cults and the hold they have on people, and this provided a fresh (read: non-hippy) perspective on those controlling communities.
3.75 out of 5 stars.
Pair with: a full bodied merlot
Peaches to Apples 