A review by vanquishingvolumes
Tell the Rest by Lucy Jane Bledsoe

3.0

Whenever I see a book that tackles religious trauma head on, I can’t help but gravitate towards it hoping some of my own experience is reflected on the page. Not because I hope others suffered, but because as much as I know others have I don’t often meet people who are willing to acknowledge the hurt the church has caused. I either meet people who double down on the hurt being deserved or people who pretend the hurt doesn’t happen because their relationship with God is nothing like that. I’ve met good church goers and bad - but like the characters in this book the bad experiences have left me lost in what my relationship is to religion and the God they serve. 

This book does a great job of depicting this struggle through the eyes of two adults who were forcibly admitted to a conversion therapy camp. They reckon with their lives, their friendship, and the survival trauma from such a horrific summer.