Thank you to NetGalley and Quirk Books for this ARC!
This book hit me in every ounce of my feels. If you grew up in a religious household this book may be a bit trigger. It focuses on a young girl named Valerie who essentially grew up in a cult and is coming to terms with her sexuality. You can feel how much pain she is in and how isolated she is from the world. Thankfully she has allies on her side who protect her as best as she can. For me this really hit me hard. When I was younger I struggled with my sexuality while growing up in a deeply religious household. I am fortunate enough to have a mom, like Valerie, who cared enough about me to let me be me. This book is definitely a good read and I highly recommend it!

Valerie Danners is a seventeen-year-old Taiwanese American girl trying to live up to the godly and virtuous expectations of her parents. She identifies too much with the bisexual protagonist of a novel, just as the rebellious Riley moves to town. The two connect, and Valerie is falling in love. If she embraces her queerness, her family would never accept her.

One of the conservative groups that people might recognize is sometimes known as the Quiverfull movement, since women are expected to have many children to "keep the quiver full" of arrows (children) for the father's fight for God. Women in this movement are not allowed to go to college or have a job, or even wear pants. All education is Bible based or from tracts specially prepared for them; Catholics are too liberal and won't be saved by their definition. Remember the Duggar family from TV? These conservatives often decry any sexuality that isn't strictly heterosexual, and this is the place where Valerie grew up. She has some flares of rebellion, questioning her best friend, meeting her father's gaze, and stealing a book from the library with a bisexual protagonist. It's exactly this reason why education is such a fraught topic for the deeply conservative, because they teach obedience and hellfire, not critical thinking skills.

Valerie is a teenager questioning herself and her place in the world from the start. Riley is proof positive that other isn't evil, and there are those raised in this isolated community who escape it and label its tenets as abuse. As Valerie learns about the qualities of cults, that there are other ways of living a fulfilling life, and that her family and friends see her a the problem, she rebels further. We feel her dismay and how torn she is to realize that she will never fit into the mold her parents want. It's a painful place to be, and many people will recognize what it feels like. My heart went out to her, and I was glad she had a network of people able and willing to help. Even small gestures of kindness can mean so much, especially for someone so isolated. The numbers at the back of the book are helpful for information and a place to start learning or reaching out if needed.

Valerie's whole life has revolved around the Lord and the bible obsessed cult called the Institute. She spends her days learning to be obedient to her parents, prepare for a life as a perfect wife and mother, and above all else serve the Lord. Her foundation feels solid until one day she comes across a queer book at the library and she begins questioning everything she's ever known to be true. When Riley, a beautiful rebellious girl who was kicked out of private school for kissing a girl, joins the institute, Valeries life is turned completely upside down. With a growing love for Riley, Valerie begins to explore her beliefs and values.

I was extremely excited to read this book, and I honestly really enjoyed most of it. You can feel how personal this story is to the author from the very start and I think a lot of queer people will relate to Valerie's struggle. I think stories like this one are so necessary and important, I just don't know if this one moved me as much as I had expected it to. Valerie is so quick to renounce the beliefs of the institute with so little information from the outside world. I would expect there to be a lot of internal conflict when you start exploring worldviews other than the one you've been fed your entire life. Valerie, while going through something terribly difficult, felt a little too surface level for me.

While this book didn't hit every mark for me, I am glad to read a story about someone accepting who they truly are and seeking comfort in found family. I know this isn't every persons story, but it is one that may give hope to those who are in the same position as Valerie.

As a queer person who was raised in a conservative religious household, I felt incredibly connected to this book. So many quotes are highlighted in my copy because of how relatable this story was. Not only is this story well-written, it's timely and an important voice that lifts the facade to expose the horrors of being queer in a family that doesn't accept you and is willing to shun you for not aligning with their own personal preferneces and beliefs. Naudus shows the reality, pain, and eventual hope for freedom attached to growing up like this in beatifully written, emotional, page-turning prose.

Valerie and her family follow strict rules, including dress codes--especially for girls--homeschooling, and more. She only spends time with her family and those from her church. She chafes at some of the rules, especially when she meets Riley. Riley is everything Valerie has been taught to reject. Soon Valerie falls for Riley, around the time she realizes that she and her parents are in a cult.

Valerie starts to question everything in her life, including what matters more--her family's expectations for her or what she wants to do with her life? Can she be herself and keep her family?

This book reminded me of numerous cults that I've heard of over the years, especially the ones that demean and dehumanize women, girls, LGBTQ+ people, and anyone who doesn't fit into the cult's rigid rules. It opened my eyes to some of the practices that people don't question while they're in the cult, but that appear really creepy to me. It was a fascinating read, and it's a book I will definitely read again.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for an ARC of this book!

Thanks to NetGalley and Quirk Books for an advanced reader's copy in exchange for my honest review.

If I'm being honest, my first impression of this book when I saw the title was, oh no this is going to be cheesy as hell. And then I actually started reading this book. This book hit me like a gut punch. I didn't grow up in a religious cult like the author and our main character, but I did grow up religious, which changed when I realized my queerness in high school. The church I grew up in was never outwardly homophobic, in fact I can remember sermons on loving your neighbor, no matter who they are, but the church also never publicly stood up for the queer community. It's a type of homophobia that I think most don't notice right away, if ever. I also was shunned in my youth group for sharing my depression and anxiety with people who I thought were my friends, and accosted by the youth directors that I was, and I quote, "doing this for attention." So, like many people who grew up in a church and then came out, I have deep religious trauma, although mine is also connected to the fact that my depression was essentially not allowed to exist in that space. However, I have gone through a lot of therapy and over the years changed my beliefs, and, being 27, I thought my religious trauma wouldn't affect me while reading this.

I was wrong. This book made me so sad, even after I finished it. I knew what it was leading up to and I felt so much dread at having to read whatever kind of fallout happened that I ended up downloading the book to my iPad so I could read it after I left my computer. I needed to know the ending.

I am so glad I decided to read this and look past the cheesy title. It was absolutely worth it and probably in my top five favorite books of the last year. It is definitely not perfect, there are moments where I could tell the writing was that of a debut author, and there were absolutely parts that were cheesy, but I still loved it. This is one of the first books I've read it a long time where I felt like I had to write down certain quotes because of how hard they hit me in the feels. I'll included those quotes below, but remember this is an ARC, and therefore may not be the final wording.

Overall, this book is good. This book shows love, and courage, and humor in the face of potentially life changing decisions, and should be read with caution for those with religious trauma, but it should definitely be read.

5/5 stars

Quotes (from advanced reader's copy, may not be final wording):

""Hey," someone says behind me. I turn, and there is Riley - looking stunning, I notice absolutely clinically."

"I'm high on spite, amazed that the things I've heard reviled from the pulpit have become my guidebook to learning about the world."

"I can control so little of what happens around me, sometimes a bruise I ask for feels better than one inflicted without my consent." (side note: this is so real, and I felt it in my soul.)

In my opinion, it is a really hopefull book. So YES it is a little easy to escape, to learn about feminism, racism, etc., to fall in love and build a new life. However, I don't think it's the point. The author is clear, she wants to imagine a world where a girl like her could escape and discover herself and be pround to be queer when she is still a teenager.
Even if, we know how the story will end (in a happy ending) the tension is still eavy. Each scene with her parents, or Hannah maid me shudder and uncomfortable. I could not let go of the book, I really wanted to see our protagonist happy.
It also is beautiful to see how queer story can help, how the joy is very important.

2.25 Stars

While this is no doubt a book that covers some important topics, there were a few aspects that hindered my enjoyment.

Gay the Pray Away is centred around Valerie, a teenage girl raised in a religious cult whose only real refuge is reading. One day, she comes across a book with the word "bisexual" in it - a word she has never seen before - and from there, she starts to realise there's so much more to the world than she has been taught. Coinciding with this is a new arrival to the church, Riley, who Valerie realises she has feelings for. This book follows Valerie as she begins a journey of unlearning the oppressive rules she has abided by for most of her life, while learning more about herself and who she loves.

While this was a quick read, my main issue with this book is how quickly everything seemed to happen. Within the first 50%, the romance is already pretty much fully developed, and even though the characters themselves acknowledge that it is a fast-burn, it still meant that I didn't really care about them. It also meant that not much happened in the second half of the book (until about the 80% point), which made it more difficult to get through.

I also thought that the way the characters acted was a little off sometimes. For someone who had been sheltered in such a way for most of their life, Val seemed to adapt remarkably quick. Also, while I was happy to see that open communication was a key part of Val and Riley's relationship, sometimes it would read like "therapy speech", which took me out of the story a bit.

Although I was bored at times, I still can see how the themes are important and would likely hit close to home for a lot of people.

Gay the Pray Away is a heartfelt and impactful YA debut that delves into the complexities of growing up queer in a conservative, religious environment. The story follows Valerie Danners, a seventeen-year-old who begins to question her upbringing after discovering a queer romance novel at the library. This discovery sets her on a path of self-exploration and challenges the beliefs instilled in her by her fundamentalist Christian homeschooling group. ​

Valerie's journey is both painful and empowering, and one I related to very much. As she navigates her feelings and the restrictive world she inhabits, she forms a connection with Riley, a new girl who is confident, kind, and shares Valerie's multiracial background. Their budding relationship offers moments of joy and solace amidst the tension and fear of being discovered. ​

Naudus doesn't shy away from depicting the emotional and psychological toll of religious extremism. The narrative addresses themes of homophobia, emotional abuse, and the struggle for self-acceptance. Yet, amidst the heavy themes, there's a thread of hope and resilience that keeps the reader engaged and rooting for Valerie's liberation. ​

The writing is sincere and accessible, making it easy to connect with Valerie. Readers can learn a lot from Valerie's story. Gay the Pray Away is a book I will be sharing with everyone I know.

I loved this book. It was so beautiful and so sad at the same time.

The only problem I had with this was that the relationship moved far too fast. One moment Valerie is realizing that being gay won’t send you to Hell & then the next she’s showering with the girl she has a crush on.

Other than that it is a perfect book that I will recommend again and again.

This is a story about breaking free, about unlearning and relearning how to love oneself, and about embracing queerness not as a burden, but as a gift. It’s empowering, affirming, and left me both teary-eyed and smiling.

“I see the word bisexual. I have never, never seen this world before, and the room is spinning with the importance of it.”

This book… this book gave me all the feels, honestly.
Valerie is such a great character, and she walks along such a long path during the story.. From the guilt of not being able to fit in the frame decided for her, from the frustration of not being considered like her brother, she gains more and more confidence, asserts herself as she discovers what the world has to give and impose –to herself first– who she wants to be. Her love story with Riley acts like another trigger, maintains her quest of freedom, but I absolutely ADORED that the spark that pushed her to go after her already here questioning first came from a book, and from the joy and the validation she felt while reading (I can relate to that SO MUCH).
The religious parts had me shiver, but in another kind of way. This was so intense that I sometimes had to put the book down for a moment, just to catch my breath.
After the dread and the tension, closing this book is just like going out in the garden during spring, just after a shower. Valerie’s awakening was beautiful, like the taste of grapefruits, like onions in ramen, like honeysuckle’s sent, like words and sketches scribbled in the margins of a book, like hope under the rainbow.
As a fort-ish YO person, I wish I had such books as a teen (even though I come from an atheist and open family, but which doesn’t mean non-ignorant) and I’m delighted –and so, so grateful– to have the opportunity to read them now, especially the YA ones. I truly hope this book will find the hands of the person(s) who will need this story to grow, to hope, to shine.

Thank you to the author and Quick Books for this wonderful eARC on NetGalley. My opinions are my own.

Fiction read for teens and up. Which, I enjoyed just for a well written story. Valerie is a teenager, growing up, with questions about her life and the direction her parents are guiding her.
LGBTQIAP+ is central to the story line. That is an issue many teenagers find themselves struggling with. The author is definitely writing from a person perspective of growing up in a strict church/cult environment that doesn’t accept different choices. I’m glad she found an escape that suited herself from this sort of environment. So this can be read as a LGBTQIAP+ finding yourself and your life plan story.
But also. Parent’s role is to protect guide and encourage, and give freedom for their children to find their own way in life. So, I think that this can also be read as a more general story about dealing with overbearing parental control and finding a route to be happy with your own future. Thank you to Quirk Books and NetGalley for the ARC.

"If that weight of sin was somehow lifted off me, what would I do? Who would I be?"

It was easy connecting with Valerie and rooting for her all the way til the end. The world she lives in and her beliefs felt close to something I know too.

The book was, overall, enjoyable and it definitely could let one think and reflect over some topics, but I felt like everything happened too fast.
Living seventeen years in that kind of world wouldn’t make it so easy to get rid of all the ideas of her community in only a couple of weeks. Valerie doesn’t fully share her parents’ beliefs, but still, she has very strong ideals for someone so deep in that world. She reads books, but her studying -and world- is limited to what doesn’t go against the Bible, so how can she be so strongly against concepts such as heteronormativity (most people don’t even realize what it means without being in a super religious cult), marrying young, the different chores women/men have? Same thing goes for her relationship with Riley, definitely sweet and hopeful to read about, but maybe too fast.
I think all this journey should have been slower, but overall it was nice seeing her getting over those beliefs and finding out who she really was.
And that also applies to her mother, suddenly changing towards the end, so out of character that we can’t talk about character growth.

The characters were limited to Val’s family and Hannah’s, all one-dimensional, but I guess that’s what happens when your life is dictated as these characters’ lives are; they felt distant, flat (and definitely scary and unnerving). Valerie changed so much and so fast, it seems like she was split into two different characters.

The writing style was smooth and slow paced, not much happened, but what kept me reading and finishing the book in one sitting was Valerie and her chances of getting out of that nightmare of life.

Okay so YA isn’t my default genre anymore but I absolutely adored this book. Even though I didn’t grow up in as intensely cult an environment as our protagonist, Valerie, I did have a Lot of a very Christian education that was determined to shove my queerness in a little box, so I found this to be a very cathartic read. Following Valerie as she deconstructs and begins to pull away from her cult, I think this book did a really good job balancing the humanity of all of its characters with the casual cruelty and dehumanization that cults foster.

I did feel like Valerie and Riley’s relationship devolved a little too quickly for my personal taste, but it didn’t take me out of the book at all, and did feel in line for two queer girls coming out of an intensively repressive environment. Don’t imagine this would be an issue for other readers, but felt worth noting.

All in all, 4/5 stars from me. Thanks to NetGalley for the ARC!

4 ⭐️ Thank you to Little Mountain Media and NetGalley for providing an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Books change lives and this is exactly what this book sought out to do.

Book Summary: A teenage girl realizes she is queer while living in a religious cult. The author brings you along her journey which is wrapped in so many raw emotions. It’s not easy being a teenage girl let alone one living through religious trauma.

This book brought literal tears to my eyes. This was 100% a best case scenario but it did describe what a worst case scenario would be. It gives you hope for the future and shows that your community may not come from blood relatives. You may be surprised who is an ally.

I look forward to what this author has in store for the future!

this kind of story is really important right now, but at the same time i do want to say to start with that you definitely need to read the CW page for this before reading. this is a book about heavy religious trauma, brainwashing, and abuse in a cult. it’s about the horrors that some people have to live with and the love for each other that can set us free.

it is also a story about the public library and all it can do for us. the library not only hopes people figuratively escape into the beautiful world of books, but it is a resource that can be used to physically escape our lives when we are unhappy or in danger. it shows exactly why conservative groups are always working so hard to ban books, because they know people can use them to unlearn the brainwashing that they need to make us think we don’t have the right to freedom.

freedom of access to information is important whether it is fiction or non-fiction, to teach us about the world and to hear stories from worlds different from our own. this book is informative, raw, and beautiful - and definitely clear that it was written by someone who has been through this herself.

5⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Gay the Pray Away is a story that left me tearful for all the right reasons.

Valerie is a Christian. A Christian of the highest order mind you. Where the man rules the house, woman are second and the only right teachings are God's. Valerie tries to be a good Christian as only they know how , but somethings gone amiss.
She's begun to question why things are like this. Why must she follow the rules? Why must she be something other than herself? The final tipping point in the book is a book of all things. What she reads will ignite something in Valerie that will not be contained.

Into this turmoil walks Riley. Riley is opioniated, artistic, and of course beautiful. All things Valerie wishes she was. She clings to Riley as her perception swiftly changes. She's not part of a Christian church; she's part of cult. And she needs to get out.

The intimate moments between Valerie and Riley are what touched me the most . The hand holding, the hugs, the laying in the sun. All simple things that were such grounding points for the both of them. That if they could feel such joy at something so small that everything else would be worth it.

This was an emotional read, covering serious topics including identity, sexuality, and religious fundamentalism. The author has experience of growing up in a super conservative religious environment and it shows in how sensitively things are handled. I think this would be a perfect read for a younger teen!

I absolutely adored this beautiful and heartbreaking story and read it in one weekend. It hurt my heart but also made me feel seen. "To everyone who was served hatred and told it was love: We deserve better." Growing up in a high control catholic conservative family, isolated and homeschooled, told that I wasn't queer, and if I was, no I wasn't, this book spoke to me on multiple levels. There were so many moments reading this that I felt with such pain and knowing in my chest.

This should be required reading. To anyone that has ever felt alone, not enough, been told you're loved when it's really hate, please read this book and I hope you feel seen and accepted.

Thank you to Quirk and NetGalley for the advanced E-book!