Review of Prayer Wasn't Enough by Dee Ready

Dee Ready’s memoir, Prayer Wasn’t Enough, is a journey of self-discovery that allows glimpses into the secret life of nuns, a life that is revealed to be both less dreary and more fascinating that I could have imagined!

Several questions naturally arose as I began reading: Why would a modern-era, college-educated woman choose life as a nun? What is life as a nun really like? And why, after initially being so certain of her calling to this path, did she ultimately choose to leave it?

These questions are answered through an artfully-woven series of vignettes that take us behind the scenes in the convent and at the mission schools where Ready taught, or that offer insight into a dysfunctional childhood that played a greater role in her life choices than she at first understood. The answers are revealed gradually, creating a degree of mystery and suspense that surprised me – I was amazed at how invested I was in the story of a nun’s life!

The stories she shares offer the perfect cross-section of Ready's experiences and are alternatively joyful, sad, surprising, maddening, insightful and humorous. Her writing is clear and vivid; we feel her joy and hope as well as her confusion and despair. We relate to her humanity – the clumsiness and stubbornness that get her in trouble, her quest for perfection and her attachment to ideals that sometimes conflict with the “rules.” We cheer for her ingenuity and perseverance, for her kindness, and for her commitment to doing what she thinks is right. We relate too, to the self-doubt and self-criticism that cause her so much suffering, and we root for her to develop the same amount of compassion for herself that she so readily shows to others.

Despite its particularly rare set of circumstances, Ready’s story reflects universal aspects of every life, in which choices and mistakes are made; in which we try and sometimes succeed and often fail. By sharing her unique story, Ready connects to us all and shows us that it is exactly this imperfect journey that allows us to grow and learn, until eventually we come to know and accept who we really are and what it really means to be human.

Prayer Wasn't Enough is available in Kindle e-book and paperback from Amazon.com. 

Click HERE to go to the page on Amazon.