Leaving the Fold
By James W. Ure
Candid Conversations with Inactive Mormons
Signature Books - 1999
ISBN: 1-56085-134-1 - Trade Paperback
Nonfiction

Reviewed by Carolyn Howard-Johnson, MyShelf.com
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James W. Ure has written a book that examines the spiritual, religious and political lives (for in Utah one's faith is inextricably entwined with one's politics) of several prominent Utahans. If anyone suspects that there is only something here for those who are connected in some way to that state, I would counter with the argument that we are all here to learn from one another.

I read Leaving the Fold because Jim is an old friend. We were budding journalists together on the Olympus High Thunderbolt and later cub reporter/writers at the Salt Lake Tribune. I came to it thinking that it might be a gift of sorts, albeit one that might dredge up unwanted memories and-after writing my own book set in Utah-I had quite enough therapy in printer's ink.

Instead of therapy, I got philosophy. Instead of pain or discomfort, I found beauty. He interviews with consummate skill. His subjects are varied (from the self-deprecating former Governor of Utah, Calvin Rampton, to the author/politician/philosopher Edwin Brown Firmage.)

Ure knows his audience and, like a good journalist, speaks to them. By doing so with authenticity and by encouraging that quality in others, he speaks to a wider audience. That he doesn't prepare the initiate-that is, those with no experience of the Utah culture-is the only shortcoming of the book. Many readers (including me at times) could have used footnotes or short synopses of some of the essays and books mentioned. Such an oversight does not diminish this effort; there is much to be learned about the important things in life between its covers.

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Carolyn Howard-Johnson is the author of This is the Place.