Forsaking All Others by Allison Pittman

Over the years Camilla Fox changes the way she chooses to worship God, her Heavenly Father. When she married Nathan Fox, she gave her heart to the Mormon religion. After the birth of her children, Melissa, Lottie and a little boy who doesn't survive, Camilla decides this isn't the religious values she wants to teach her children. I think the arrival of Amanda, the Sister wife just adds wood to the fire. Brigham Young and Joseph Smith's doctrinal values just about turn Camilla's stomach. She decides to leave Nathan and the children. Putting distance between herself and the religion will help her hear God's voice more clearly.

"In my heart, I renounced the teachings of the prophet the day my son died, but I remained faithful to my marriage. I chose my husband over my faith. But when the time came for me to ask the same of him, I begged him not to bring another woman into our home, but I held no such place in his heart."

Camilla's inner and outer journey is fascinating. I was encouraged by her ability to remain strong during her ordeal. Like all of us there is one point when she loses the battle with her faith. Still, she rises again to walk a narrow road where she finds people judging her and must wonder whether she will ever see her children again. I was especially moved and totally disturbed by her friend Evangeline's behavior. It's hard to take the fact that a woman can deceitfully hurt the woman she claims as friend.

FORSAKING ALL OTHERS by ALLISON PITTMAN also made me realize the difficulties in moving out of a religious body. People don't take kindly to another person rejecting their religious values. Life can all of a sudden become a religious battlefield. Children can become the center of the storm. Their innocence doesn't leave them with the possibility of why their world is suddenly topsy turvey.

"Your papa is married to your Auntie Amanda, and now your Auntie Evangeline, too. And...well, when I was gone for such a long time, I decided that maybe I shouldn't be his wife anymore."


Throughout the book I did learn about the Mormon belief. There is mention, of course, of Brigham Young and Joseph Smith. Allison Smith doesn't make this a manual about the Mormon faith. There is just enough information in the novel. Then, if a person would choose, they could study more about this religion. I think the book is mesmerizing. I can't wait to read the authors other books.themormonreligion
allisonpittman





Comments

Sidne said…
Nice review. I'm going to place this novel on my reading list. sounds wonderful. autobio and memoirs and christian fiction are my best reads.
September 22, 2011 at 5:32 AM
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Catherine E. Mckinley had a deep desire to know about Indigo. It became her purpose.

Image
"We watched the woman disappear into the bend of the road. It was unsettling. She seemed possessed, driven by some mimetic force. I was afraid that that force was also a part of me. I was also a worshiper, set wandering in an unfamiliar land."   It seems this week I have been driven to write about my mother. It has happened more than once. Here she is again. Tapping my shoulder a reminder that she loved blue. There is the one and only photo of her where she wears a dress of blue. The photo was taken years and years ago. In the photo are my two nephews, my mother and myself.. The photo was taken in West Philadelphia. She sewed it. A light blue that now I wish to call "Indigo." I have much to learn about Indigo. It is easy to pick up on the author, Catherine E. Mckinley's, fervent love for the color. One day my son asked me my favorite color. I said, "I don't have one." I don't. Perhaps, I choose colors by mood. Today red  and tomorrow green,
Read more

First Chapter First Paragraph

Image
http://www.bibliophilebythesea.blogspot.com Closed until June 13     "Michael Hunter stared at the hand-lettered sign on the Gull Motel office, expelled a breath, and raked his fingers through his hair. Not the welcome he'd been expecting after a mind-rumbling thirty-six-hour cross-country drive to the Oregon coast. And where was he supposed to stay for the next three weeks, until the place opened again?"
Read more

Are these the types of lives we are seeing and reading about in the news today?

Image
"The difference between life and death was information:..the greatest danger was not the river, but the desert beyond. There the temperatures were so hellish they melted stones, there was no water, and they could be preyed upon by scorpions, wildcats, and hungry real coyotes...Rattlesnakes, as well as coral, moccasin, and darting indigo snakes, came out to hunt at night, the time when the migrants set off, because the daytime heat was lethal." isabelallende
Read more