Review by New York Times Review
AUGUSTINE FAMOUSLY ASKED God to grant him chastity but not yet. In "Confessions of a Latter-day Virgin," her account of remaining chaste and Mormon well into her 30s, Nicole Hardy pleads with God to just take it from her already - because if he wants her to wait until marriage for sex, as her church demands, he's going to have to toss her something she's been unable to find on her own. As she writes in typically winking fashion after a grueling bout of online Mormon dating: "If the kind of man I want exists within the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, he is rare, not unlike the endangered red panda of the Himalayas. Show me an LDS man who's wickedly funny, politically liberal, brighter than the average bear and uncommitted to 1950s gender roles, and I will show you the shaggy tail and waddling gait of the Ailurus fulgens, its mischievous mouth rife with bamboo." Hardy's story is that of a headstrong, dramatic dreamer who grew up wanting much more for herself than the marriage and children her church deemed necessary for eternal life, and yet remained wary of defying her faith's conception of spiritual fulfillment. She aspires to write and she aspires to meet a man like the one described above, and in the meantime her heart is broken by the fact that non-Mormon men who might fulfill her are off limits. There are wisecracks to spare and no shortage of wry asides. But laced as it is with a tortured strain of self-denial as rare in secular American culture as that red Himalayan panda, Hardy's story may seem appealing - and comprehensible - only to those who have been raised in conservative Christian churches. Through quite a bit of the book she defensively chafes against the numerous platitudes issued by her fellow faithful. Yet while she has good reason to erupt at the bad theology - at one point she receives a patronizing e-mail from a bishop telling her she should repent for going on vacation with an unmarried man, because he suspects sin has transpired when it did not - the memoir can read uncomfortably like a string of tantrums. When Hardy writes of what brings her joy outside church - salsa dancing, scuba diving, travel to Cuba - her words take on an inviting poetic radiance. But the Mormon Church also brought her joy, she says after leaving her faith, and what's missing here is a record of the ways in which "it made my life feel purposeful, and centered and right." She doesn't really make clear why the church inspires her to sacrifice the many opportunities for sexual pleasure that come her way, whether she's waitressing in her hometown, Seattle, or living for a spell in the Cayman Islands. We know she fears the loss of her family's love if she turns her back on this spiritual home, but its comforts never take substantial shape on the page. "I am, and always will be, who God made me," she writes with admirable confidence soon after she makes her break with the church (though not with belief). Who is the God who made this particular woman, a woman with a taste for new places, able to bring back these wise sentences as souvenirs: "How is it I can feel peaceful, glorified, connected in the literal presence of sharks? That next to them, I can forget to be afraid? And sitting still in the house of God, I feel myself drowning." Who would Hardy say this God is? We don't see enough of this deity in her book. A fuller glimpse would have made this a consistently, rather than fitfully, powerful document of what a liberated woman's faith looks and sounds like. Hardy wanted more for herself than what her church deemed necessary for eternal life. CARLENE BAUER is the author of a memoir, "Not That Kind of Girl," and a novel, "Frances and Bernard."
Copyright (c) The New York Times Company [October 6, 2013]
Review by Booklist Review
What is it like to be a devout Mormon woman in today's world? Poet and essayist Hardy first opined on the matter in her New York Times Magazine column, Modern Love, in which she laid bare her personal struggles to be true to both her heart and her faith. In this achingly candid memoir, Hardy delves more deeply into the dilemmas faced as she aged out of the church's single ward and into her thirties. At a time when her mind should have been on the Mormon tenets of marriage and motherhood, Hardy found herself more interested in writing. (Reading Refuge by Mormon writer Terry Tempest Williams had proved a pivotal moment in life. A Mormon woman, writing? I didn't know such a thing existed, Hardy writes. Could exist. ) Falling in love with a Catholic man vexed Hardy further. Could she make it work with a partner who didn't share the views that had guided her throughout her life? Although her account occasionally gets bogged down in too much detail, Hardy's confessional tone is engaging, and her story is moving.--Block, Allison Copyright 2010 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
In this captivating memoir, poet and essayist Hardy recounts her efforts to reconcile the tenets of her Mormon upbringing with her evolving personal identity. She decides to leave the church at age 35, having long questioned the rules it prescribes for women. Taking stock of her life in her mid-20s, Hardy writes, "All six of my best college friends are married. My brother is married. Every Mormon girl in my high school class, and probably two or three below me, is married." As she wrestles with her sexuality, religious choices, and the search for a husband, she also travels, takes up salsa dancing, moves to Grand Cayman island, and falls in love with scuba diving. Hardy is ambivalent toward having children-an ambivalence that is nearly unheard of in the church. "I've never met an LDS woman who has chosen to be childless, the same way I've never met an LDS woman who has chosen not to marry." Hardy also pursues her love of writing by obtaining an M.F.A. from Bennington. Her memoir is a candid, insightful account of her struggle to find peace with herself. Agent: Susan Golumb, Susan Golumb Literary Agency. (Aug.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Kirkus Book Review
A poet and essayist's candid account of how she came to painful terms with her sexuality and her Mormon faith. Growing up in the Mormon Church, Hardy (This Blonde, 2009, etc.) learned early on that the only "right way to live" was by following Mormon doctrine. She also learned that, as a woman, a home, babies and a "hot dad" of a husband were the three most important things she could aspire to have. Unlike the Mormon girls she knew, though, Hardy wanted time to live life on her own terms before committing to the eternal partnership promised by an LDS marriage. But she faced two problems. With every year that passed, the pool of available Mormon men grew smaller, and any males she dated outside the church were more likely to expect sex from her. Tormented by efforts to keep "[her] body separate from [her] spirit," Hardy sought release from desire in the sexy rhythms of salsa and flirtations that sometimes led to more than she bargained for. Meanwhile, she fumbled her way through a series of unconsummated relationships throughout her 20s and 30s. Despite the endless sexual frustrations and the despair into which she eventually sank, the author still found the beginnings of the personal fulfillment for which she longed in teaching, travel and writing poetry. It wasn't until she was over 35 that Hardy finally renounced celibacy and broke away from the church. To her credit, she still managed to maintain respect for the imperfect and often contradictory system that, though unable to completely accept or understand her need for independence, still "taught [her] so much about integrity and love." A searching, sensual celebration of one woman's struggle for identity and autonomy.]] Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
