This is an incredibly intense, beautifully written book about patriarchal evangelicalism, familial abuse, and faith persisting in the midst of all of this. It wasn't my favorite read, since it focused so much on Miriam's violent preacher father and the ways he thwarted his daughter's spirit on all fronts, but it was certainly an engaging, wrenching read.

Published by Simon & Schuster on May 25, 2021

A teenage daughter comes to realize that her father, “the Faith Healer of East Mansfield, Texas,” in whom she has invested her whole-hearted support, is a liar and a sinner. Actually, Samuel Horton is a grifter with a serious anger management problem, but Miriam Horton is too young to see her father in those terms. In her early teens, Miriam is beginning to consider rebellion against her father’s strict rules, although she doesn’t dare express those thoughts in his presence. Nor does she have the typical motivation for rebellion, having apparently never entertained a sexual thought in her life. She does have a mild crisis of faith, which at her age and in her situation is indistinguishable from a crisis of family. Unfortunately, Miriam never makes the intellectual leap that would cause her to look beyond her father’s overbearing behavior and to understand that she’s living in a religious subculture that will never value her, despite her growing belief that she is every bit as capable as her father of performing miracles.

Miriam’s mother apparently believes that Samuel has the power to heal, although she might just be playing her role in the family. Miriam’s brother Caleb definitely believes. He’s being groomed as the family’s next great faith healer. Samuel’s failure to heal most people who come to him is easily dismissed as God’s choice or a lack of faith on the part of the infirm, while his few apparent successes are embraced as proof of Samuel’s spiritual power. Blaming God for failure is the great convenience of a religious con. Those who might wonder why Samuel can’t heal his daughter Hannah, who was born with cerebral palsy and needs crutches and braces to walk, are told that her condition is God’s plan.

Miriam’s best friend Micah is diabetic. The story suggests that Samuel failed to heal Micah, that Miriam secretly healed her, and that Samuel is taking credit for it. The “miraculous” change in blood sugar levels is temporary, leading to one of many rifts between Samuel and his deacons. That rift and some violent episodes in Samuel’s life are dividing the parish and making it difficult for Samuel to pay the mortgage.

Miriam secretly enters the healing game with a fury when she learns that she can heal more capably than her father. Samuel is infuriated when he learns that she is a usurper. Even Miriam’s mother has been taught to believe that it’s a sin for a woman to do the work of men. Miriam’s biggest test will come if she decides to heal Hannah.

Revival Season is told from Miriam’s perspective as a teenager whose family travels the summer revival circuit. The novel’s focus on Miriam is dictated by the story’s first-person narration. The problem is that Miriam, having been home-schooled and largely homebound, isn’t an interesting character. She speaks in clichés (“I watched Papa like a hawk”) because her life as a southern evangelical is a cliché. A teenager who seems to have no interest in moving beyond the narrow confines of her existence (apart from secretly using her healing powers) has little of importance to share with the reader.

Miriam’s deeply flawed father is a more interesting character than Miriam simply because of his flaws. How does he feel about his crumbling life when parishioners abandon his church and other churches stop booking his revival appearances? If he really believes he can heal, how does he feel when that power dissipates? We get a sense from a sermon that he feels threatened by Miriam. We get a sense of his distress or frustration from Miriam, who perceives his growing tendency toward violence and rage, but Miriam’s perspective is shallow and self-absorbed, befitting her age and upbringing. How does Caleb feel about being the heir apparent to a father who is on the verge of losing his revival empire? We only catch a glimpse of Caleb’s evolving realization that his father can’t really heal people. A third person perspective that looked more deeply into the lives of Samuel and Miriam’s other family members would have offered greater insight into the world that Miriam inhabits.

Fiction allows readers to imagine, and perhaps to understand, lives that are far beyond their own. The novel doesn’t help the reader understand enough about the subculture that embraces revivals and faith healers. The novel is missing the atmospheric detail that creates a sense of realism. The characters seem like stereotypes — the abusive preacher who puts self-interest above concern for those he claims to heal, the meek wife who wants to leave but can’t bring herself to abandon her children — and the story does too little to give them personalities outside of their stereotypes.

I imagine Revival Season is intended as an allegory of female empowerment. It almost works on that level, although Miriam’s empowerment is equated with having an equal right to be a faith healer. Whether Miriam is actually healing anyone rather than creating the appearance of healing, like her father does, is never clear. The story would have been more honest if it suggested that Miriam was just as capable as her father of being self-deluded or a grifter. That would have preserved the allegory while adding intellectual honesty, but it also would have made Miriam just as unsympathetic as her father, so I understand why Monica West chose not to go in that direction. If Miriam wanted real empowerment, she’d encourage her mother to walk away and take the kids (a moment that is foreshadowed but never happens).

The novel might also be read as an indictment of faith healing, home-schooling, and a culture of ignorance, but that doesn’t seem to be the novel’s intent. This is a book that might appeal to certain readers of faith, depending on the nature of their faith. The story has some merit, but it just didn’t appeal to me.

RECOMMENDED WITH RESERVATIONS

I LOVED this book. SO MUCH. This is a glimpse into the lives of a Southern Evangelical family and what happens when faith is questioned. I found it to be both gripping and beautiful. This is the coming of age story at its best. Whether you are religious or not, I highly recommend picking up Revival Season!

This book was beautifully written. My heart ached for Miriam the entire story but I genuinely loved seeing her transformation and her confidence bloom. This was a perfect read and I would recommend absolutely anyone to read it.

Thank you to Monica West, the publisher, and of course Netgalley for providing an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

REVIVAL SEASON is a well-crafted literary coming-of-age story that kept me turning the pages.

At first, I wasn't sure I bought into the dialogue; I thought the manner in which the preacher father speaks to his family seemed forced. However, I got used to it, and of course West has crafted the dialogue this way on purpose. If you have just started the book and are experiencing the same doubt, I encourage you to stick with it.

Coming from a Southern Baptist background, I was interested in the subject matter, which did not disappoint. I especially enjoyed how the narrative explores the feminist angle.

Miriam is a compelling main character and, despite her young age, the novel has a sophisticated sense. West does a fabulous job at setting the scene so that the reader is immersed fully into the story world. I look forward to more by this author.

This coming-of-age novel is so beautifully written that it's hard to believe it was a debut!

Modern revivals are not something I know much about but Monica West's writing brought the world alive. I loved Miriam as a character and rooted for her as she realized she had the power to heal and as she developed the strength to find her voice. This book tackles faith and sexism and the role religion can play in building people up and tearing them down in a riveting way. And that ending! I can't wait to read whatever West writes next.

Thanks to Simon & Schuster and NetGalley for a copy to review.

First, thank you to Simon & Schuster for the review copy of this one via NetGalley! I read it in one day, partly as an ebook and partly as an audiobook (and a good chunk as I stood in line outside Strand Bookstore waiting to sell them some used books — best way to pass the time!). I was totally sucked in.

The story is about a girl named Miriam, whose father is a famous Baptist preacher known for an ability to heal the sick. She’s brought up pious and conservative, not even allowed the vanity of clear nail polish, where women know their place and family members who don’t convert are treated as if they don’t exist. One summer, at the start of that year’s “revival season” (tour of the South seeking converters), Miriam sees something she shouldn’t, and her understanding of her father and the world shifts. Then it seems as though Miriam herself may have the gift to heal, and the shift becomes a shattering.

There are tough parts of this book (plenty of content/trigger warnings), but throughout I was drawn deeply into Miriam’s world and thoughts. The characters in this book are so well written, and the tension and conflict are so acute, that I found my heart literally pounding at the end. I loved the seamless inclusion of magical realism (or, if you will, miracles), and I was cheering the whole time throughout Miriam’s complete transformation.

This is one of those novels that I think a lot of different readers will enjoy, as it toes the line between contemporary and literary really well. You should check it out!




CONTENT WARNINGS:
Self-harm; Domestic abuse and child abuse; Giving birth (described as it happens); Stillborn (in the past/talked about); Ableism (misplaced intentions to “fix” a disabled person)

A literary reawakening is here to charm our hearts and convict our spirits this literary season with Monica West’s debut novel 𝙍𝙚𝙫𝙞𝙫𝙖𝙡 𝙎𝙚𝙖𝙨𝙤𝙣. If you needed a bird's-eye view into a Southern, Black, evangelical community, then 15-year-old Miriam Horton professes her truth about her faith, her family, and the power of God. West writes elaborate entangled characters that frequently question God, their past life choices, and how their futures might look. At its best, this novel works to save the reader from the fear of not believing in themselves and their purpose.

West notes that in Southern Baptist communities women are forbidden to stand in the pulpit, to teach the word, and to even heal. As a former Southern Baptist, I can attest to this folly of the church and realize just how many Miriams are damaged because of this unorthodox and sexist teaching. Miriam has the gift of healing. She tells us, “According to First Corinthians, spiritual gifts were doled out to men and women equally, but according to Papa, women weren’t allowed to exercise those gifts over men.” Doing so would be a sin, only in her father’s eyes, and “would disrupt the delicate ecosystem of [the] church.” In the novel, Miriam unnerves the entire congregation.

One major takeaway in this novel for me is the acknowledgement of female empowerment and visibility. Miriam’s bravery is stout and tall. It looks fear in the face, forges ahead, and takes risks to make sure it finds a place to deliver others to safety and hope. Miriam’s character shows the women trapped in church that there’s a way out of an unspeakable faith, in which, women endure too much under the guise of Christianity, like abuse, rage, and sexism. Women can be powerful and purposeful for God, too!

𝙍𝙚𝙫𝙞𝙫𝙖𝙡 𝙎𝙚𝙖𝙨𝙤𝙣 is looking for new converts. Are you ready to purchase? Buy now!

A book that is an acquired taste with strong religious themes and if you don't already have an interest in the politics that happened behind the scenes in any denomination, then this book may miss the mark for you. Miriam is a young woman who has traveled with her parents and her two siblings each summer as her dad is a revival pastor who is also a healer. He travels with the family by car each summer in hopes of converting new believers and healing those who need it. When one summer something goes wrong, it impacts both his summer revival plans and his home church in big ways.

Part of the reason that this book kept my attention was my personal interest in religion and the sociology behind a group of people following the same set of rules for their life. And at the same time that I was reading this book there were quite a few things going on with the Southern Baptist Convention and I was following that which made this book even more interesting as at the convention they were debating the ability for women to play leadership roles in the church. And reading Miriam's father and his thoughts on women not having the ability to heal just really struck a chord with me. My senior thesis in religious studies was about the role women play in church leadership (some odd years ago!) and its crazy to see in this book and in the current news that this a topic still up for debate.

There were a few times where I felt as though I wasn't reading as closely and got a bit confused by details of the plot, but in the end, I think I got the moral of the story and really wonder what happened to these characters beyond the final page.

A story of the Reverend Samuel Horton, an evangelical preacher, and his family shared through the words of his 15-year-old daughter, Miriam. A summer that followed a shameful incident during the previous revival season when her father had assaulted a pregnant teenage girl and they were forced to leave in shame. Since then, word had spread, and the number of attendees had dwindled, which only served to make him more anxious and angry. As his world slowly unravels, his family, particularly his wife, is the recipient of his ‘righteous’ anger, using not his words to lash out, but his fists. The same fists he used in his early years as a prizefighter.

’We had lived under the canopy of that belief my whole life, eating and drinking faith in God first and Papa second, never questioning Papa’s healing abilities the same way we never questioned the existence of the sun, even when it was hidden behind clouds. Our belief left no directives about what to do if our faith in Papa faltered.’

Miriam tries to remember and hold on to the good days, to focus on those good memories, rare as they were. Those days without rain, with large crowds filling the tents, days when her father left these meetings with his ears ringing from the praise of the people inside the tents. Days when her father didn’t falter, and her mother, Joanne, was happier. Before her brother Caleb began to distance himself from her, and spent his time trying to become more like their father. She believes in the miracles that have come from faith.

When Miriam’s best friend Micah faints and collapses from diabetes, Miriam calls for help, but her anxiety gets the better of her as she waits on the arrival of the ambulance, without much thought beyond desperation for her friend, she recites her father’s words for a healing. Words that are forbidden to her and other women, she immediately begins to atone for her sin as the sound of the ambulance draws near, but Micah seems to vaguely recall hearing, or at least feeling the truth. Miriam saved her.

More complications arise as this story moves forward in time, and Miriam’s life begins to unravel, her father’s temper seems to flare more often as he begins to see that others are losing faith in him. His wife who has had many reasons to not openly question his actions begins to withdraw emotionally seemingly from everyone. When his church begins to question him on his decisions, he begins to unravel even more. The more he unravels, the further he pulls away from everyone, and his family pulls away from him in return, which only seems to serve as proof to him that he has reason to be angry.

An atmospheric debut shared through the voice of an unforgettable narrator, I couldn’t put this book down.


Published: 25 May 2021

Many thanks for the ARC provided by Simon & Schuster

Revival Season - a debut novel by written Monica West - is a blistering behind-the-scenes story of faith healing/tent revival culture in the South. Told through the bold voice of the oldest daughter of a violently abusive pastor, this book pulls no punches as it presses on every question inherent in how horrifying things are sometimes found in holy places. I wish the ending has been filled out a bit more, but perhaps that is the case with most captivating books. This is a hard but important read. Thanks to NetGalley for providing me the opportunity to read this book.

This is my youth. This is the life in which I was raised. The author has magnificently captured the hot summer Baptist revival tents, it's inhabitants, the joy along with the desperate need of many that attend. The core of the story from all of the characters' perspectives is faith. We follow a preacher and his family as they hit the summer Revival Season. They trek through small towns in the south and mid west, bringing with them the shadow of what once was. There is the father and his subservient wife, along with three children. Each character has their own faith in what they are doing, yet to all, it has that tinge of loss. Things are not the same. Through the acts of the Faith Healer father, his reputation is irrevocably tarnished. This has a great effect on him and his pride as well as working its way down through each of the family members. The interaction of their grief and their fading faith is fascinating to read and live.

This story felt slightly too real for me and I had to take multiple breaks throughout. I think my difficulty is a testament to how well Monica West captured the rural, fundamentalist Christian south that I grew up in. Revival is a very important time in the Church and this book pinpoints so much of the troubling reality of the fundamentalist culture. The troubling power of male domination and female suppression is persistent throughout and Miriam's story is one unfortunately known to many.

5/5 Stars

Thank you to NetGalley and Simon & Schuster for providing me with an e-arc of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Powerful, well-written. I loved this story of a girl growing up in the south as the daughter of a pastor and healer. She begins to see her father for who he really is, which happens to all of us to some extent, but this is different. The she begins to see herself for her she really is and realizes that the little world in which she has lived may no longer fit.

The author’s skilled writing brings sexism and religion fundamentalism to life. I kept having to remind myself that this story is set in modern times.

I devoured this book and enjoyed it tremendously. I was so nervous at the end to see what would happen and enjoyed how the author ended the book. An excellent read!

Thank you to NetGalley and Simon books for the free copy in exchange for an honest review.

This book is a family drama about an abusive husband and father. It is told from the point of view of his oldest daughter Miriam who begins to doubt her father’s omnipotence as she has her own experiences as a faith healer. The book is written without any skepticism at all about the ability to heal. It is extremely earnest. That was a complete turn off for me. As far as I’m concerned, all of these people should have been arrested for duping the naive and vulnerable. The writing was ok, it just wasn’t my kind of book. I received a free copy of this book from the publisher.

Revival Season is a well-written debut novel with an interesting plot. I do think I expected more out of this book than West gave me. I grew up an evangelical Christian, and I was probably looking for more scandal about a traveling preacher who heals people. Ultimately this book is a coming-of-age story of a teenage girl. I do wish we got more of Miriam's story. The ending wrapped up pretty quickly, and I would have loved to explore her character on the page more.

I loved this book. The writing was just wonderful and engaging.

I really felt for Miriam as she navigates her way through her relationships with her family, her church family, and God. Her life for the most part has been very sheltered. Then she witnesses events that shatter her trust, question her faith and force her to build new relationships. She has a lot of complex situations to deal with and there aren't very clear, easy solutions.
Throughout the book, Miriam is brave and loyal and loving while forging her own tentative path.

These are characters that I found myself wondering about after I finishing the book. <spoiler>I especially wonder if Caleb will grow up to be a park ranger.</spoiler>

*I received an advance copy of this book from NetGalley and the publisher and I am required to disclose that in my review in compliance with federal law.*

Monica West a debut novel, Revival Season explores the annual pilgrimage of evangelicals across the world. The book is haunted by two shadows: the specter of Samuels stillborn child, Isaiah, and the violent handling of a pregnant teenager. We also spend a lot of time pondering the father's anger and how it will affect his family. West joins a growing number of American writers who have explored the role of the Black church in society and how it can harm those who seek refuge. West describes the ways that patriarchal Christianity and gender violence can unite in the person of Samuel. The tour stops at a church where the abuse happened.

Congregants leave the church and Samuel's demons plague him. Wests plot is a clever twist on the patriarchal order. Miriam, Samuel’s daughter beings to develop her spiritual awakening and her ability to heal physical ailments through her underground healing practice. In Baptist culture, miracles are events that happen every day, and they are often held in the hands of saints. West shows us how easily we can get caught up in the world of vice. Tackling the lives of women and girls living with physical and mental health conditions, West avoids the usual tropes about people with disabilities and instead focuses on the transformative power of love. It is difficult to avoid falling in love with Miriam. I found myself rooting for her as she came into a more tender version of herself. Thank you, Simon & Schuster, for the gifted copy.

This is the second book this year that I have had to continuously remind myself that what is taking place is in the current timeframe, as opposed to something happening in the last century. This is due, in part, to some antiquated ideals paired with timeless behaviors and practices. As a pastor’s child myself, a lot of the atmosphere and activities were very familiar, and I was appreciative of the fact that the author is respectful of the faith and views of God while still pointing out and uncovering the imperfect human nature prevalent in the religious community. The supernatural aspect is a fantastic and relevant twist, even with its own inconsistencies, and the familial relationships are compelling and provocative.

I definitely recommend this if you would like to step away from the normal read and explore something unique.

An advanced copy of this book was sent to me by the publisher. The opinions are my own.

Revival Season, written by Monica West, is one of those novels that came to my attention thanks to the sheer number of genres it seems to fit into. According to Goodreads, it has tags for literary fiction, Southern fiction, adult fiction, religion, contemporary, feminism, and more.

Every summer for fifteen (plus) years, Miriam Horton and her family have packed into the family car and headed to a small town in the south. It was a religious trip for the family – literally. They're traveling to see famous Southern preachers, after all.

However, this latest summer has shaken Miriam and her belief to the core. The revival she was expecting didn't quite happen, and instead, Miriam was witness to something horrible and unforgettable. Her doubt and confusion only grow once her family makes it back home.

Revival Season was both a fascinating and difficult read at times. Miriam's voice was easy to understand and appreciate; it was more the events happening in the world around her that made it hard to swallow it all. Especially considering how believable some of those circumstances were.

This was a complex tale, as it should be. Events in this story forced Miriam to reconsider her faith, and that is never an easy experience. I'm sure that it was difficult to write and was probably very hard for some readers to read.

I loved the feminist messages woven into Miriam's narrative. That alone would have kept me reading, even if everything else got too much for me. So thank you, Monica West, for those brilliant moments.