Gloria Beth Amodeo, raised in a laidback Catholic faith, joined Campus Crusade for Christ as a college student. Her debut memoir, God's Ex-Girlfriend, is a thoughtful, wrenchingly honest account of her seven years inside the movement. It details her experience with Cru, as it's now called, explores the reasons she clung to the community she found, and charts her struggles to get out.
Though Amodeo believed in a loving God, she struggled with her self-image and worried over her mother's mental illness and addiction to pills. When she met Cate--beautiful, self-possessed, logical and confident in her faith--Amodeo became captivated by the community Cate offered her and the seeming ease of belonging there. She questioned the movement's Calvinist and often sexist theology, especially its stances on LGBTQ+ people and premarital sex. But for a time, Cru offered a warm, welcoming community and a way to build an identity in an intimidating world.
Amodeo writes in sharp, often witty prose about her insecurities, the appeal of the people she met through Cru and her constant unease about befriending nonbelievers in order to evangelize them. She charts her increasing anxiety, her eventual "breakup" with the movement and her journey toward a more expansive life. Though its ending feels a bit rushed, Amodeo's memoir is an important perspective on a powerful parachurch organization that has indoctrinated numerous college students. But more than that, it's a funny, absorbing account of a young woman finding her way in the world and learning to embrace mystery rather than rules. --Katie Noah Gibson, blogger at Cakes, Tea and Dreams