Boy erased : a memoir of identity, faith and family /
Conley, Garrard,
Boy erased : a memoir of identity, faith and family / Garrard Conley. - 340 pages ; 20 cm.
Movie tie-in. Originally published by Riverhead in the United States, 2016.
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 nineteen-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 institutionalised Twelve-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 heartbreaking, at times triumphant, this memoir is a testament to love that survives despite all odds.
9780008276980 9780008294908 9780008294915
Conley, Garrard,
Gays--United States--Biography.
Sexual reorientation programs--United States.
Gays--Identity.
Ex-gay movement--United States.
Gay men--United States--Biography.
920.9306
Boy erased : a memoir of identity, faith and family / Garrard Conley. - 340 pages ; 20 cm.
Movie tie-in. Originally published by Riverhead in the United States, 2016.
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 nineteen-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 institutionalised Twelve-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 heartbreaking, at times triumphant, this memoir is a testament to love that survives despite all odds.
9780008276980 9780008294908 9780008294915
Conley, Garrard,
Gays--United States--Biography.
Sexual reorientation programs--United States.
Gays--Identity.
Ex-gay movement--United States.
Gay men--United States--Biography.
920.9306