In these eleven stories, a Mennonite minister’s daughter moves from a youthful, exuberant understanding of her family’s faith toward religious doubt. Stumbling comically at times, Ruthie navigates life with and without the rules in which she’s been raised. Always physical, often sexual, Ruthie’s search for personal truth leads her from missionary outposts in Paraguay and Brazil to Mennonite towns in northern Indiana and central Kansas, a vandalized Native American site, women’s healthcare clinics, and lingerie shops on the secular, melancholy East Coast. Ultimately, these stories consider how faith and identity intertwine, the cost of abandoning one’s cultural heritage, and the complicated longing for return.
“What a magnificent book. So scary, so sad, so strange, so brutal, so true, so expertly written, so brave, so forlornly Mennonite, so fiercely beautiful in so many ways. Ruthie is a creature who will live forever inside me. Is this a book of stories, a novel, neither of these, both of these? Who cares? It’s art. High, heart-thumping, unforgettable art. I was shaken by this book, but I was also made more wholly human.”—Tim O’Brien, author, The Things They Carried
“In these marvelous, deeply suspenseful stories, Sears writes with remarkable intimacy and lack of judgment about the deeply conflicted Ruthie and the religion she no longer believes in. By the end of What Mennonite Girls Are Good For, I felt I’d seen ‘that ancient truth—how small we all stand.’”—Margot Livesey, judge, John Simmons Short Fiction Award
“With rare intelligence and sensitivity, Jennifer Sears has created remarkable stories set at the intersection of old-time religious ardor, erotic exploration, and the complex, often cruel weirdness of American life. What Mennonite Girls Are Good For is a singular achievement.”—Mary Gaitskill, author, Bad Behavior
“Because these stories tell truths about the lives of girls and women, they reveal the brutality of patriarchy, invisible as the air we breathe. Similarly, set in a religious subculture that values self-sacrifice and peace, they expose the avarice and injustice that sustain North American life. Yet, Jennifer Sears knows it’s never that neat. With skill, guts, and intelligence, she’s created a novel in stories that is as profound as it is compelling. Even when it’s hard to read, it’s even harder to put down.”—Julia Spicher Kasdorf, author, As Is
