Boy Erased

A Memoir

De: Garrard Conley

Narrado por: Michael Crouch

The New York Times best-selling memoir about identity, love, and understanding. Now a major motion picture starring Nicole Kidman, Russell Crowe, and Lucas Hedges, directed by Joel Edgerton.

"Every sentence of the story will stir your soul" (O Magazine).

The son of a Baptist pastor and deeply embedded in church life in small town Arkansas, as a young man Garrard Conley was terrified and conflicted about his sexuality.

When Garrard was a 19-year-old college student, he was outed to his parents and was forced to make a life-changing decision: either agree to attend a church-supported conversion therapy program that promised to “cure” him of homosexuality; or risk losing family, friends, and the God he had prayed to every day of his life. Through an institutionalized 12-Step Program heavy on Bible study, he was supposed to emerge heterosexual, ex-gay, cleansed of impure urges and stronger in his faith in God for his brush with sin. Instead, even when faced with a harrowing and brutal journey, Garrard found the strength and understanding to break out in search of his true self and forgiveness.

By confronting his buried past and the burden of a life lived in shadow, Garrard traces the complex relationships among family, faith, and community. At times heart-breaking, at times triumphant, this memoir is a testament to love that survives despite all odds.

©2016 Garrard Conley (P)2016 Penguin Audio

Reseñas de la Crítica

"Exceptionally well-written... This timely addition to the debate on conversion therapy will build sympathy for both children and parents who avail themselves of it while still showing how damaging it can be." (Publishers Weekly, starred review)

"In a sharp and shocking debut memoir, Conley digs deep into the ex-gay therapy system... An engaging memoir that will inevitably make readers long for a more equal future.” (Kirkus Reviews)

Characters anger

What I disliked as an ex gay / gay man was that this didn’t center on the sweetness of Gods redeeming love for broken sexuality. I get where he’s coming from- been there done that, but there is more. … and such were some of you (1 Corinthians 6:11)as a man I will always be attracted to men but I am washed from the shame and am able to be okay with who I am and serve Him wholeheartedly

Raw

It's interesting. I never went through exgay therapy, but I am battling some of the same questions he has at the end in regards to faith. I actually think my mom thought therapy would have been a solution at the beginning but I was lucky and she eventually did her own reading of at least one book written by a queer christian before she said anything too drastic to me, not that I didn't catch the little things. I connected with his story better than i probably could have in any other way i think. I'm at working seething with anger at time and on the verge of crying. It's definitely not the same, but there's a lot of things in there that I think a lot of people go through and internalize the big difference being it's not shoved in our faces continually and packaged with the label cure.

I thought this would be more memoir

I was super excited for this story. I thought there were would be more personal experiences, but it seems to be a repetitive story that doesn't really give you much to work with. Very shallow. You don't get very attached to the writer.

Powerful but sometimes slow

Slow at times but a powerful brutal important and honest story thats amazongly told amen

Hauntingly beautiful

Every person who is struggling with their sexuality should read this book. Hopefully it’ll make you proud of who you are.

touching

as a gay man from a religious family this story touched my heart. it told the story of the kind of things I always feared about coming out to my family. Please if you're child comes out to you read this before you react.

Boy Erased

Excellent book. Many young, confused adolescents need to read. I would highly recommend for straight people to read.

little thin...

Listened to this in anticipation of the movie, figuring the books are typically better than the movies. From what I heard, they'll have a lot of filling in to do to make this worth watching. It's an important story told from a singular stream of consciousness point of view, but it feels a little like a college application essay: "Describe an experience that challenged your worldview. How did you respond? What resources did you draw on to maintain your views or how were your perceptions expanded?" I think the performance was partly responsible, but if I'd been actually reading it, the writing itself felt as young and breathlessly earnest as the voice artist. I'm glad this story has been told, and that the author both survived the psychological terrorism that was visited on him and wrote the book... just wanted the story itself to have more (or maybe just better written-?) scenes to support the internal dialogue. There were barely any descriptions of being in the program itself, unless I fell asleep listening to those parts, which I admit is possible. The scenes as read have a crazily flat affect, and the climactic "escape" left me saying- that's.... IT??!
The epilogue gets into the effects of such programs on other survivors, in their own words, and those few paragraphs are more gripping than many of the authors own chapters. It can't have been an easy tale to tell; the book as it's written feels like the author just didn't want to talk about his actual experiences, only his mental & spiritual trauma and willful rejection of the program. The result is strangely disconnecting, considering how barbaric it is that people willingly put their own kids through such programs. Glad I listened but hard put to recommend it- first ever for me: skip the book, see the movie.

I don't know what to head this

as someone who had to deal with a family similar to the author and conversion therapy as well. this was well put together and expressed things into words I've been struggling to do for years.

A tale needing to be told

Garrard’s story is an important tale to tell about the religious abuse and mental torture LGBTQ+ people have faced, and sadly, still do.