Rhoda Janzen had reached a crossroads: she had just hit forty when her brilliant husband of fifteen years left her for a guy he met on Gay.com. In the same calamitous week she was hospitalized in a horrible car accident. With no alternatives, Rhoda decided to pack her bags and head home. into the heart of the Christian sect she had spent years longing to escape.
Rhoda Janzen might be a bad Mennonite, but nonetheless, her parents and their community welcome her back with open arms, strange food and offbeat advice. ('Why not date your first cousin? He has his own tractor!') It was in this safe place that Rhoda came to terms with her failed marriage; the desire, as a young woman, to leave her sheltered world behind; and the choices that had both freed and entrapped her.
'Once in a while a book comes along that makes you laugh so much you think you'll choke. This is that book.' Viv Groskop, Observer
'Rhoda Janzen does for the memoir what Bill Bryson did for travel-writing: she takes a well-loved genre, turns it inside out with an endless parade of comedy and through her cheerful good humour makes you fall in love - both with her and her subject.' --Judith Flanders, Sunday Telegraph
`Funny as hell. Once in a while a book comes along that makes you laugh so much you think you'll choke. This is that book' Observer
`Rhoda Janzen does for the memoir what Bill Bryson did for travel-writing... A joy, a comfort and a great, pleasurable read' Sunday Telegraph
`Screamingly funny... Cool, precise, profound' Sunday Times
`Wonderfully intelligent and frank... I loved this book and Rhoda Janzen. A terrific, pithy, beautiful writer' New York Times
Rhoda Janzen might be a bad Mennonite, but nonetheless, her parents and their community welcome her back with open arms, strange food and offbeat advice. ('Why not date your first cousin? He has his own tractor!') It was in this safe place that Rhoda came to terms with her failed marriage; the desire, as a young woman, to leave her sheltered world behind; and the choices that had both freed and entrapped her.
'Once in a while a book comes along that makes you laugh so much you think you'll choke. This is that book.' Viv Groskop, Observer
'Rhoda Janzen does for the memoir what Bill Bryson did for travel-writing: she takes a well-loved genre, turns it inside out with an endless parade of comedy and through her cheerful good humour makes you fall in love - both with her and her subject.' --Judith Flanders, Sunday Telegraph
`Funny as hell. Once in a while a book comes along that makes you laugh so much you think you'll choke. This is that book' Observer
`Rhoda Janzen does for the memoir what Bill Bryson did for travel-writing... A joy, a comfort and a great, pleasurable read' Sunday Telegraph
`Screamingly funny... Cool, precise, profound' Sunday Times
`Wonderfully intelligent and frank... I loved this book and Rhoda Janzen. A terrific, pithy, beautiful writer' New York Times
