Mennonite in a Little Black Dress

This book was not what I was expecting it to be.  After reading the description on the back, I envisioned a memoir about a rebellious ex-Mennonite returning to her conservative, Amish-like community.  Not so.  It actually described a 40-something woman who had married an Atheist, stopped practicing her Mennonite beliefs, became a professor, and survived two terrible accidents followed by a nasty divorce from the aforementioned Atheist husband.  That's just in the first chapter.  The rest of the book is a kind of disjointed story about how her year-long sabbatical visiting her Mennonite parents and brothers and ex-mennonite sister in order to obtain material for this book.

I was very confused by this story.  I think most people, including me, believe that Mennonites are very similar to the Amish -- living non-wordly lives on farms with no electricity or automobiles, etc.  The author of this memoir, Rhoda Janzen does not explain the facts until her "History Primer" at the very end of the book.  Apparently, modern Mennonites are exactly that -- modern.  As in, they live among everyone else, drive cars, have televisions in their house and attend public schools.  Rhoda does briefly comment on some Mennonites that are still very conservative, but she doesn't really mention the differences between liberal and conservative Mennonites.  I'm actually still confused by the religion.

To be honest, I have mixed feelings about this book.  I started it months ago and stopped after barely a few pages.  Boring!  However, it came up as the August book in my book club, so I found it on Paperbackswap.com and managed to read the whole thing.  There were some enjoyable passages and she has a humorous edge to her writing, but for the most part it was jumbled and hard to read.

Despite my general dislike for the story, there were parts to which I could relate very well, coming from a conservative religious background myself.  For example, in one chapter she writes about the church-instilled fear of worldly things.  "Did the degree to which we were sheltered occasion the fear that...I felt with the onset of adolescence?  Ah, those were the days when we saw a predator in every man who approached...Scared of school events, horrified byt what would happen if I let my guard down to have a beer, terrified whenever a boy asked me out, I was as skittery as one of those squirrels that freeze as your vehicle approaches (53)."

In the following passage, I was also reminded of watching movies in my childhood with my dad frantically searching for the fast-forward button on the VCR remote to quickly move past inappropriate scenes:

"On the few occasions when we kids were allowed to watch TV, a parent had to be present.  My father monitored the proceedings like a stern prison guard.  If any character on any television show, married or single, made a move toward an on-screen kiss, there was Dad, wielding the remote like a Taser.  Quick to change the channel, he'd sometimes mutter in dark disapproval, 'Smut!' (55)."

I guess it was interesting enough, and I might recommend it to someone just to see what their reaction to the book might be.  Let me know if you read it and what you think!