No Going Back by Jonathan Langford

A gay teenage Mormon growing up in western Oregon in 2003. His straight best friend. Their parents. A typical LDS ward, a high-school club about tolerance for gays, and a proposed anti-gay-marriage amendment to the state constitution. In NO GOING BACK, these elements combine in a coming-of-age story about faithfulness and friendship, temptation and redemption, tough choices and conflicting loyalties.

This novel was sent to me by the author to read and review back in October.  At the time I had some other books I'd promised to review and then spent November doing NaNo.  I have a huge pile of TBR, but my promises come first so I picked this one up and started to read it.  Then I put it down.  It didn't interest me.  There were no faeries, it wasn't a fantasy.  It was reality and I wasn't sure I could handle the subject matter right then.  My mother is a million miles away in Florida and all of the sudden she was ill and talks of nursing homes and twenty four hour care made me unable to handle realistic fiction.  I read some other books I'd promised to read and some I had to review within a week's time of receiving or I wouldn't be likely to get my next choice when the ARC's were being handed out. 

 But the day after Christmas, I picked it up and I couldn't put it down.  I was immediately gripped by the story of Paul a sophomore in high school who knows he is gay, but also knows it goes against everything his religion teaches.  He is very much in the closet, having not told anyone he is "same sex attracted" as his religion calls it.  What religion?  Mormon which I knew nothing about and still know only a very small part of it.  But Paul is very proud of his faith and very faithful and wants to stay true to his vows to the church.  His best friend is the first one he comes out to.  Chad is a stereotypical teen, calls him a faggot and is afraid of this information and his best friend.  But the relationship between Paul and Chad transforms from Chad just accepting his best friend as long as they don't talk about it, to a totally different type of relationship.  Chad learns to self control and how to be tolerant and even protective of Paul as the bullying starts and then gets worse, at school and at Church. 

But Paul's story isn't the only story being told.  There is the marriage between Chad's parents Richard, the bishop of the ward and Sandy.  Richard has a job and his duties at Church which leaves less and less time for him to spend at home with his family and wife.  There is constant tension there and the conflict has to be addressed if the marriage is going to survive.  Sandy is jealous of the time he spends on everyone else but her and she doesn't really want to be at home being a mother.  She wants a career and she wants to stop having to pretend to be a good bishop's wife and be who she really is, while not disappointing Richard.

Then there is the relationship between Paul, who has a high ranking role in the junior leaders of the church and his Bishop, Richard, Chad's father.  The things he reveals to him, feels comfortable telling him, feels like  he has to tell him, and the way the Bishop helps him,  I have to say, I'd lie like hell.  Nope nothing to confess here.  I've been very good.  Never done one thing wrong.  Don't need any help at all.  Especially when I'd have to face him every time I went to my best friend's house.  My sex life in my high school years was definitely my own business and I'd never have discussed it with the minister at church.  It's a very different religion than what I grew up with.  These kids feel it's their duty to tell their bishop if they well I can't say as I don't have a rating warning on my blog, but I'm not in the habit of confessing to a religious leader.  But, if I had to confess that I had touched myself or done something with my boyfriend, Richard would be the man I'd want to talk to.  Even in his mind he is the least judgemental person you could ever hope to meet and I do hope to meet someone as non judgemental as him, but I believe he's only a fictional character.  Everyone has their judgements, I admit to mine and I'm not sure a man like him exists in this world.

And there's the relationship between Paul and his mother Barbara.  While Paul is telling her he's gay she just keeps telling herself  "I have to be a mom right now, I can fall apart later".  She senses things are wrong or different and is open enough to what Paul reveals to her to keep the line of communication open.  She's the one who recognizes just how hard this will be for him as a Mormon and she looks for signs of depression or anything she can do to help.  She makes the best move for him in the end to help him out of a horrible situation, to save him the humiliation and hatred of closed minded people.  She puts her son's well being before anything else, which is as it should be.

But the most important story in here is the relationship Paul has with his faith.  He is not happy that he is attracted to boys.  He wants to be a good Mormon.  And he believes he can deny himself sex in this life so that in the next life he can have a wife and kids.  He sees this as a burden he has to bear in this life for his reward in the next life.  At one point, Paul receives his Patriarchal Blessing and after he reads it over and over he realizes it doesn't mention anything about him getting married and having children.  It's something he's not sure he can do without being attracted to a woman.  It bothers him so much that he goes to speak to the patriarch that did the blessing for him and asks him about his patriarchal blessing not mentioning a family.  The Brother that spoke his blessing reads over his blessing and then says, "One thing we do know from the scriptures is that the way of exaltation is open unto all.  If you live the way you should, if you live a life of righteousness and service to the Lord, there's absolutely no reason why you won't be able to be married and have a family in the eternities, whether or not you have the opportunity to have one in this life."  Paul's faith is so strong that he's willing to vote against gay marriage (if he were old enough) and he believes he can live his earthly life without sex for an eternity with a wife and children after death.  That is a strong faith and at the end of the novel, I really have no doubt that Paul will succeed and hope that God's plan does actually work the way the Mormon's believe because he deserves it for what he'll give up for the rest of his life.

This book is not filled with religious doctrine and preachy.  Not at all!  I would have returned it and said I just couldn't read it.  I have my own personal religious beliefs and I'm still trying to work a few things out so anything very preachy is a big turn off to me.  This absolutely did not affect the story at all.  In fact I learned a few things about the Mormon faith that I really didn't know.  I do not watch "Big Love" on t.v. but remember it's for entertainment and not education.  Mr. Langford, the author of this novel is Mormon and would definitely know right from wrong as far as the belief systems and rules and relationships.

Towards the last few pages, the tissue box came out.  I tried to be quiet because it was 2:00am and everyone was sleeping, except me the insomniac or reader with a great book.  Mr. Langford develops the characters so well, you feel exactly what they're feeling and at the end you can't help but cry with Paul and the bishop as he talks to Paul from his heart.  It was gut wrenching, bittersweet, you don't want that to be the solution and it makes me love Richard the bishop all the more.  I'd marry him if I didn't have the best man on earth lying next to me married to me for seventeen years.  Richard's visit is especially timely after what Paul had just been through with his own father.  We'll just say Paul's father won't win any father of the year awards.  The entire story is told through various people's eyes so you get a really good view of who everyone is and how their minds work.  Some are so childish and mean spirited and others are just trying to figure things out.  I don't think I've seen any more well developed characters in the novels I've read this year than in this novel.

As far as this being YA, yes, but definitely older, thinking YA.  I don't think it gives the message to deny who you are or to be who you are.  I think for Mormons, it would be an encouraging story.  For others it might also be encouraging if you were trying to follow your strict religious views yet you were same sex attracted.  But it isn't anti-gay.  It does show how bullying can affect kids.  And the bullies aren't always the ones you expect them to be.  The Mormon kids didn't come out squeaky clean in this- they were bullies more so than any others when it came to homosexuality.  But it's a great teaching tool about bullying without hitting you over the head with it.  It shows bullying  doesn't just happen in the schools.  And the bully isn't always the big jock playing football or baseball, it could be the girl sitting next to you in Sunday School.  I remember her even today sitting across from me in choir. And I'm not sure why I was the object of her bullying.

I am so glad Mr. Langford sent this novel to me to read.  No I am getting no compensation for this review at all.  It is not the type of book I'd usually go for, but I found so much to recommend about the book.  The extremely well developed characters, their growth, the various relationships and how they grow, and how faith, in something bigger than yourself, can carry you through, guide you, help you make decisions, shape you, for better or worse.  I'm not sure I've ever had such a deep faith in anything, like Paul.  I hope I do someday.

Heather in Sandwich