After Catherine Coldstream’s father died when she was just 24 years old, she felt unmoored, unsure which direction to go next in her life.

So she did what few do: she became a nun.

She joined the rigidly-tight community of sisters at Akenside Priory. In this memoir, Catherine shares what it was like when she entered the confines of the basically silent monastery to live the Carmelite life. She took vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience so that she could be married to God.

Parts of the monastic life went well for Catherine. But bit by bit, life in the convent became suffocating.

Eventually Catherine decided she had to leave, if she were to stay sane.

This is a beautifully written and fascinating true story of good intentions in a community gone bad, set in the backdrop of faith and the human spirit.

My thanks to NetGalley for the review copy of this book.

A thought-provoking memoir on one former nun’s experiences in the church, what drew her to the clergy and why she ultimately left. Reminded me a bit of Educated.

Actual rating 2.5

Although I'm not religious, I found the premise to be interesting and obviously unusual, as one doesn't typically hear about nuns "escaping" their orders. Sadly, this book did not live up to expectations. Coldstream frequently comes across as not entirely sane, as evidenced by many of the choices she describes making, but at the same time, she appears to see herself as an exceptional person who is treated badly by virtually everyone she's surrounded by. The vibe that comes across is that even though she joined the order for herself, everyone else should be treating her like a queen for deigning to be there, and also why aren't you all doing things the way I do them? It's confusing and irritating in turns. I think there definitely were problems in her order, and that things went bad, but without hearing any other sides I'm unconvinced that the picture she's painted is entirely based in reality. It was disappointing, and a much longer read than it needed to be.

My thanks to St. Martin's Press, the author, and NetGalley for the opportunity to read this ARC in exchange for an honest opinion.

I grew up in a strict Catholic household, and as a teenager, considered joining the religious life and becoming a nun. I’ve read plenty of stories about women who became nuns, fascinated by the myriad reasons why they decided to do so. After losing my faith a few years ago and renouncing organized religion as a whole, I am more drawn to stories about people who have left Christianity (Catholicism in particular) and the religious life. This book was one of them, and I’m grateful to NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press for the opportunity to read an ARC.

The author became a Catholic after losing her beloved father at age 24, and then joined a Carmelite monastery in northern England. Her love for the beauty of the monastery’s natural surroundings and the religious life itself was evident in the first half of the book from her lush and poetic descriptions of her new home. Readers can easily picture themselves there, although Catholic terminology may be hard for some to grasp if they are not familiar with the religion.

Eventually, the politics and bullying from a clique of nuns within the order became too much for the author, and she ran away. The mother superior of the order even beat the author in her cell late one night. The author returned to the monastery a few weeks after running away, but would officially leave the order two years later, and embark on a new life as an academic and author.

Overall, I liked this book. The author described her life within the convent exceptionally well. I do feel like this memoir could read as a cautionary tale for people to be careful when making life-altering decisions in the wake of overwhelming grief. Additionally, although the author put the blame for what happened to her squarely on the shoulders of those evil, rogue nuns, she failed to examine how the religion she had joined fostered the cognitively dissonant atmosphere and conditions that led to this behavior in the first place.

I think this book was good. . The cast of characters was interesting and all so different from one another. I love the setting and environment this book created it really helped to create well rounded and dynamic characters

Catherine Coldstream’s “Cloistered” allows a glimpse into the world of monastics and their everyday lives through her own memoir. As she journeys through the process in becoming a nun, Coldstream faces challenges which often have root in overpowered higher-ups and misconceptions about others. In a monastery as secluded as the one she is in, it is not too surprising that trouble would eventually brewed.

At some point Coldstream must decide what is best for her, especially as time goes on and it becomes apparent things are changing (for the better or the worse).

I am not usually one for memoirs, however the premise captivated me as I, and others who have never had monastic experience, once hold the assumption that there was always an unchanging structure to the monastic life. I’ve always known there to be troubles within the church (especially considering my own denomination recently went through a rather nasty split), but I was surprised to see just how much could go wrong within a secluded community such as the Carmelite monastery.

I enjoyed this novel, even if I’m not the biggest fan of nonfiction or memoirs.

This is a memoir about a woman who wanted to become a cloistered Carmelite nun. She was following in a long tradition that stretches back to medieval times. Women became cloistered nuns in those days to, perhaps, escape marriage and find more freedoms, including intellectual ones. Catherine Coldstream had her own reasons.

She joined a community with such commitment and hope. Readers follow her experience there and discover, along with her, that life in a cloister does not always mean a life of peace. There are issues, power struggles, and conflicts. What will the author choose to do-stay or go? And, perhaps, more importantly why?

This is a compelling memoir and one that I recommend.

Many thanks to NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press for this title. All opinions are my own.

If you’ll allow me the indulgence to speak about the personal, one thing you might not know about me (unless you know me really, really well) is that I am involved with a Christian meditation group through my church on Monday evenings. My reasons for joining are private, but it’s always an experience to sit still and do nothing but chant the mantra “Maranatha” repeatedly for a good half-hour. (I participate over Zoom, but used to meet with the group in the chapel of my church — a lovely space that I miss — before the pandemic.) Even if you have a so-called “bad” session of mediation, you can always take something out of it. At the very least, if I go into meditation feeling anxious, chances are that I’ll be a lot calmer when the session is over. To that end, that’s why I picked up the book Cloistered for review. Though sent to me by a publicist blindly without me asking for it, the work was appealing because the memoir is about a Carmelite nun who took a vow of silence for 12 years. (I’m trying not to split hairs here in writing the previous sentence, but things are a little more complicated than that.) Something is appealing about living a life of contemplation, but it turns out there’s more to the story — and it needed to be told. Warning: some spoilers abound in the next paragraph.

The author describes joining a convent in northern England after the death of her elderly father. She was just 24 years old at the time. The reason for the connection is kept private, which is a little frustrating to the reader but is also paradoxically understandable. However, she joins as an enthusiastic novice. She spends the time between joining and taking her final vows of a life of obedience — a period that takes about four or five years — ranging her emotions from excited to lacking faith and thirsty for something more than just following directions and hiding her true emotions, which is what the leadership of the convent wants. The trouble ramps up after Coldstream takes her final vows. On becoming a full-fledged nun, Coldstream is then thrust into a world of political upheaval where a Mother Superior is trying to hold onto her power, though the cloister’s constitution doesn’t permit this. When a new Mother Superior is found — from a defunct monastery that folded into the one the author attended — the new Mother Superior is gaslit and bullied into relinquishing her power bit by bit. Coldstream, meanwhile, starts being bullied for having controversial views about teaching, openness, and wanting to read more philosophy, whereas the other nuns want her just to shut her mouth and go along with the flow. Finally, Coldstream is beaten viciously by one of her own, and then she flees the abbey during the nighttime to seemingly start a new life — though she comes back to the cloister for another two years, at which time she officially is devested of her vows.

Cloistered is a bit of a slow read at first. And it meanders. Coldstream does have the habit (pardon the pun) of talking about one subject, such as the abbey having an icloistnflux of feral housecats wandering around the abbey, to something completely different, such as the power structure of the monastery. However, the book picks up and builds momentum as you read it, gradually unfolding a history of bullying and abuse that is, at first, emotional in tone (Coldstream complains of loneliness) before graduating to the physical. In short, even if the pacing is glacial, this is a crucial and important story that needs to be told of other abuses in the Catholic Church that are anything but sexual. Though the incidents in this book took place some 20 to 30 years ago, it shines a light on human frailty within the church and the power that a marginalized group of women will do to hang on to. After all, being a Mother Superior, as it would turn out, is just one rung below being a bishop, which is only a few rungs away from being the Pope. The reader will be shocked to learn that communiques from the Vatican were suppressed to keep the sort of stability found in the abbey before the Second Vatican Council of the 1960s. In a sense, the women of the abbey that Coldstream is a part of have no interest in “getting with the times.” And, if they do, they are driven to the point of madness.

All in all, this insider’s look at life on the inside of a nunnery is interesting but it does take its time to get to its main points. However, the journey is just as important as the destination. The whole draw of this book is to show readers how the flame of enthusiasm for a life of following the divine can be gradually snuffed out. This is also the memoir of a life mostly spent on the inside of a convent — the outside world rarely intrudes (usually in the form of a visiting priest or monk from a neighbouring abbey) and only comes roaring into this book before Coldstream had joined the convent and after she has escaped from it. (To the latter end, Coldstream is baffled as to what to do with money when her sister gives her some upon reconnecting with her family after leaving the nunnery for the first time. She hadn’t handled any finances or paper bills in the years spent behind the convent’s walls.) In the end, Cloistered is a vital book for those always wondering what it would like to be a nun and those who want to learn of the dangers of the vocation before agreeing to sign up for it. This is worth reading but be prepared for something a little unfocused and something a little languidly paced. However, once you realize the double meaning of why nun’s bedrooms are referred to as cells, this will grip you and won’t let you shake loose. This is intriguing stuff in its own way and is worth meditating over.

This memoir covers Coldstream's experience as a cloistered nun in a Carmelite order, as well as the life experiences that led to her conversion to Catholicism and her taking refuge in a religious order; it also covers the increasing dysfunction in her community and her reasons for leaving. (It in fact begins with her dramatic escape and literal running away from the community; although she did return for some time after that night, we know from the beginning that she will be leaving dramatically and fearfully. I'm not sure this was the best structural decision for the memoir, but it does encourage the reader to maintain a sense of caution and detachment as Catherine immerses herself in the religious life. We know it's not going to last, even though Catherine is sure she is pledging her life to the community.)

The memoir is moving on the subject of silence, prayer, voices raised together in the choir, and the rhythms of convent life. It is also uncomfortably believable about the increasingly painful experiences of a community breaking down (take note of the midnight escape--this is not a soothing read). I'm sure the details of Carmelite theology will also work for some readers (they clearly matter to Coldstream).

Thanks to the publisher, author, and Netgalley for my free earc. My opinions are all my own.

Informative & Eye-Opening!
This is the story of Catherine Coldstream who converted to Catholicism after her father's death and was a Carmelite nun for twelve years.
During her time at the silent monastery she describes her intense personal journey of poverty, chastity and obedience in her enclosed life.
A profoundly moving memoir detailing her quest for God's love while enduring struggles, pain and the imperfections of humanity.

Thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for an arc of this novel in exchange for my honest review.

Catherine Coldstream spent twelve years in a Carmelite monastery with twenty nuns of a silent order. She believed she was entrusting herself to God, but she finds that, spending decades away from the outside world, the order has become subject to the cult of personality and has only itself to answer to. As the honeymoon phase of her new life wears off, she shares the negative effects of the harm done when institutional flaws go acknowledged and unpunished.

I am fascinated by the lives of nuns, both in antiquity and in modern times. I guess because we are often not privy to the lives of women who spend their lives with other women and outside of society. Catherine’s journey in the order and her separation from it is told in a heartfelt and authentic voice. These communities are so far removed from the rest of us that we don’t often know much about them, let alone deeper insight into their communities. This was a fascinating account, and I was happy to learn that the author found her own form of happiness after a difficult time with her life and faith in the institution.

Have you ever wondered what being a contemplative (as opposed to a teaching or nursing) nun is like? If so, Cloistered is the memoir for you.

Being shut into a convent year after year is definitely not for everyone. However, Catherine is drawn to the sisterhood in equal measures by her love of theology and her grief at her father’s death. She expects to find intelligent discourse. Instead, she finds something completely different. Has she joined a cult? A high school straight out of Mean Girls? The 2023 United States House of Representatives? Independent thought is considered disobedient. Bullying and shunning are common. How can Catherine reconcile her ideals with the all too human reality of a group of women living in a defined space?

Was Akenside, Catherine’s convent, just one aberrant place rather than the norm? That is the question left unanswered in Cloistered. I think the book does a good job presenting a balanced view of both the pros and cons of convent life. It definitely shows why Vatican II was necessary. But at its heart, it is one woman’s story. And a fascinating one at that. 5 stars!

Thanks to St. Martin’s Press and NetGalley for a digital review copy of the book.

This is an honest account of Catherine Coldstream’s time in a monastery. Why did she decide to choose this life? And why did she choose to leave?

This story just proves that politics are in everything, along with jealousy. People are human, even nuns. And even nuns make bad choices and poor decisions. And power definitely plays an intricate part of these decisions. I am sure writing this memoir was very cathartic for the author.

This is a bit slow in places but I enjoyed learning what nuns went through and about their daily lives.

I love a book that is narrated by the author. It just makes it so real. Catherine did a fabulous job telling her story.

Need a unique memoir…THIS IS IT! Grab your copy today.

I received this memoir from the publisher for a honest review.

I wanted to read this book because I've always had an interest in different religions and their customs. We got lots of little details that I enjoyed, but I think the writing style was somewhat off-putting. It felt a bit long and overwritten.

A compelling memoir about life in a cloistered Carmelite monastery in Northumberland, England.

The author suffers a tremendous loss that completely throws her life into chaos and in seeking peace from that turmoil, she finds both God and what she believes to be her calling - joining the Akenside Priory and taking vows [though its not really as simple as that - it takes her almost a decade to finally get to take her final vows] and living a life of poverty, chastity, obedience, and silence. And I believe, that for some time, she was happy there. She found the peace from her father's death, learned to quiet her mind and immerses herself so deeply in the monastic world that she soon forgets what the outside world is really like [this comes into play later, when she decides to leave] and is convinced that she will live forever here at Akenside.

How she lives and all that happens that changes her mind, you will have to read for yourself as this is a story that best unfolds with no preconceived notions and notes. I will say that this is full of Catholicism, so if you are unfamiliar with that religion and all that it entails, this might be harder for you to read, but should absolutely not deter you - just be prepared to maybe have to look some things up, OR find a friend who IS familiar or has grown up in the church that could help you with some of the religious aspects of this book [I find that it is always amazing to learn about other cultures, because being a Nun with a vow of silence IS another culture IMO, and this one really steeps you in it].

Unflinchingly honest and richly detailed, this was one of the better "religious" books I have read in some time. If you have ever been curious about monastic life [whether personally or from a straight-learning POV], this book is for you.

I was also granted an audiobook ARC for this book and I highly recommend going into this book that way. The author narrates and she should look into the world of narration because she was simply amazing. With a straightforward way of telling a story, she has a soft, yet strong [not whispery, just soft, probably a product of her time in the monastery] voice that was just pure joy to listen to. If she ever decides to join the narration world and narrate other books, I will be first in line to read what she has narrated. Very well done.

Thank you to NetGalley, Catherine Coldstream, Macmillan Audio, and St. Martin's Press for providing this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I received an advance reading copy (arc) of this book from NetGalley.com in return for a fair review. Author Catherine Coldstream delves into her years spent as a cloistered nun in England. I have often been curious as to what goes on in a cloistered convent. How do women maintain this lifestyle of prayer and isolation? While I believe Coldstream was honest about her experiences, I also felt she whined a lot starting with the pivotal point in her life when her father died. She was 24 years old at the time and for some reason couldn't get over his passing and this seems to be what prompted her to join the Cloisters. She was not raised a Catholic, but converted to the faith as a young woman. After she joined the convent with her idealized picture of what she thought it should be, she spent ten years there. Even though I was raised in the Catholic faith, I don't think I would have lasted ten minutes! According to Coldstream, your individuality is stripped away and you are required to obey the Mother Superior without question--and sometimes the Mother Superior is a bully. Take for instance, the time Coldstream was beaten by the Mother Superior. Sometime after that, Coldstream literally ran out of the convent and made her way to her sister's house. For some reason that I will never understand, she returned to the cloistered life for another two years. After that, she went through formal proceedings to dissolve her vows with a papal blessing. I am not sure whether Coldstream's experience was common to all cloistered nuns, but it was an interesting read.

I may not be the audience for this book, but cloistered nuns, hermits, etc... have always fascinated me. Not sure what I think I'll find it, but it's interesting. There was a book written, very similar subject, that I recall reading back in the early to mid 70's. Same sort of issues too, I think. Closed orders seem like a very bad idea. They really seem to need more oversight. They also sound very cultish to me.
Book could have been edited a bit better. Writing seemed scattered. But I am sure it will find it's audience.

***Thank you Netgalley for the ARC and opportunity to read and review

Cloisters is a very well written, in depth account of a young woman’s spiritual path. It is beautifully written and so intriguing to read about the nun culture as almost like a secret society.

The writing feels very overwritten, particularly in the first and last chapters detailing the author's “escape” from her monastery.

The author's personality and attitude really irritated me. She is someone who desperately wants to be an extra-special-holy-snowflake. So she joins a monastery - the most extreme kind, of course. Then she discovers that life in a monastery isn't the same as life in heaven and that nuns have flaws. (All nuns except herself…) She judges her fellow nuns harshly throughout this whole book, especially their spirituality, assuming that she just cares more about spiritual things, and they're all shallow and “lukewarm” in their faith because they're not like her. She assumes they don't like her because they're afraid of being “shown up” by her awesome, strong spiritual and mental life. She never points out her own flaws.

Eventually, she leaves the monastery (which, yes, does sound as if it were operating as a cult, not even bothering to follow Standard Catholic Operating Procedures, if you will), and writes this book 20 years later…

Will it surprise anyone that she says she kept her faith, and yet when she talks about God, she follows with phrases like, “or whatever guardian spirit,” and “you might call this power a different name,” etc.?

Sadly, I got the strong impression that the author never actually surrendered her life to <i>Jesus</i> and trusted Him to forgive her sins. She talked a lot about surrendering to the cloister, and about how hard she tried to be good and spiritual, but in the end, it's the breathless, emotional spiritual “high” she seemed to want, rather than a relationship with Jesus, which requires humbling ourselves before Him.

Additionally, I found the book boring and too long. Not much happened, the other “characters” were not fleshed out super well, and I didn't connect with anyone, or feel like I really got to know the people talked about.

Note: There was some brief profanity.

Thank you to St. Martin's Press and NetGalley for a copy of this ebook in exchange for an honest review.

First I would like to start by revealing that I also was gifted an audiobook copy of this book. Initially gifted the ebook, I was diligently reading it but just felt like I couldn't get through all of the details and story. It was highly interesting to me as I am a Catholic and my son is in the Seminary, so I was excited to hear more about the religious life, and from a female aspect. Ms. Coldstream did an excellent job in writing and making you feel like you were there sitting beside her in her cell and praying along her side. But I hit a slow down in the book, the details bogged me down and I was waiting for the "ball to drop". So I requested the audiobook and got through it the following day. Of course, the action in the book started to speed up and the peak of what I was expecting to happen surfaced.
I enjoyed this story and the audiobook , narrated by the author was a joy. A sad story of how the institution failed a person and I pray that changes have been made to the system in our current day.