Thank you to Netgalley and the Publishing Company for this Digital Advanced Readers Copy, I thoroughly enjoyed this book!

*2.5 stars*

Loved the concept…

The cover and blurb for this book caught my attention right away. A woman who felt compelled to join a traditional (even for a religious institution) monastery and stay there for over a decade. What calls to a person to do this? I was definitely intrigued.

Sharing her experiences, from the mundane daily rituals to the more philosophical religious struggles, the author offered a unique perspective to the inner workings of this (in my mind) rigid life. While the writing itself did not keep me engaged to the story, it was a unique insight to a woman who believed she was entrusting herself to God – even though at the end I wasn’t convinced (based on her writings) that she truly did. The struggles with daily life, the women she prayed with, the structure she found stifling all balanced against a faith she searched for.
An interesting life choice with so many nuances, I wish the detailed minutia hadn’t overshadowed its telling.

Ms. Cold stream has written a very important book here. Nuns have always been a mystery to most people: they must be VERY RELIGIOUS, or they are SMARTER and Wiser than us mere humans.
In this book, Ms. Coldstream peels back what will inevitably happen in an enclosed environment and a small group of people of any type.
Alliances, cliques, and illusions of grandiose ambition blinded by the “ good for all “ umbrella…things do not always go well.
I hope any young person considering a life of religious vows takes the time to read this book. It is suffocatingly on target from what the elderly nuns I have spoken with over the years have had to say.
Highly recommend.
Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for allowing me this ARC.

I can definitely say that I have never read a book quite like this one. Surprising in many places, while the writing is always interesting and the author obviously believes in her story,

At times, descriptions were too detailed, but overall, it works well for this story. and I am still shaking my head at some of the stuff that was included.

I liked this book but I found myself skipping through it. Catherine Coldstream's story of her decade+ in a Carmelite convent in the North of England is interesting but I think it could have used another editor. Many times I found myself asking who was to blame for the intellectual and spiritual barrenness Ms. Coldstream experienced. Was it this particular Carmelite convent, all Carmelite convents, or would she have been better in a different denomination altogether? Where were the outside supervisors and advisors who were supposed to be watching out for the kinds of old-fashioned-ness that prevailed at Akenside. Was Catherine deceived? Could she have known before she chose that particular convent? I have no idea. I also can't figure out why Jennifer's mental illness 1) went undiagnosed and untreated for a decade, and 2) why Arkenside's nuns blocked Catherine's opportunities for growth and spiritual progress by linking Catherine to Jennifer. They entered at the same time but that should have been that. Then there was the breakdown of Sister Irene who went from friend to mental case in the space of a chapter. And somehow I missed the precipitating event that led to Catherine fleeing in the night.

I think a different editor would have helped sort some of this out.

A beautiful portrayal of the complexities of life in the catholic church. Well written, clear and concise, with healthy amount of flowery prose.

This book was both fascinating and discomforting. Catherine Coldstream relates the life of a cloistered nun, with details about underlying theology and religion. It is not necessary for a reader to be Roman Catholic to appreciate her story. However, non-Catholics should be cautioned that not all communities of religious women are like the one Catherine describes.

Catherine's descriptions of life in the cloister probably contain elements of truth and credibility, based on my own experiences with nuns. Her experiences there definitely seem to align with the life of a religious, especially prior to Vatican II, which brought sweeping changes to Roman Catholic religious institutions. However, I wondered why she went back to the cloistered life after having escaped, and what changed over the next two years before she renounced her vows and left for good. I can also understand the hold a community can exert on an individual, and the ways in which the Carmelite Life became part of her being.

I found some of the details about theology and her beliefs to be quite lengthy and I skimmed over them.

I received this book from the publisher and from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. The opinions expressed here are my own.

The unique premise of this intriguing memoir, in which the author details her twelve year experience as a nun in a silent monastery, immediately caught my attention. I knew I just HAD to read Coldstream's original story! I am not Catholic myself, but I find the topic to be truly fascinating. How often do we have the opportunity to experience the inside perspective of a cloistered nun??

I will say that it took a bit to get into the book but after a few chapters it became much more enthralling and then I found that I couldn't put it down.

This informative biography offers so much insight into a typically tight-lipped society. A truly compulsive read!

Thank you NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for access to the e-copy in exchange for an honest review.

After Catherine Coldstream’s father died when she was just 24 years old, she felt unmoored, unsure which direction to go next in her life.

So she did what few do: she became a nun.

She joined the rigidly-tight community of sisters at Akenside Priory. In this memoir, Catherine shares what it was like when she entered the confines of the basically silent monastery to live the Carmelite life. She took vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience so that she could be married to God.

Parts of the monastic life went well for Catherine. But bit by bit, life in the convent became suffocating.

Eventually Catherine decided she had to leave, if she were to stay sane.

This is a beautifully written and fascinating true story of good intentions in a community gone bad, set in the backdrop of faith and the human spirit.

My thanks to NetGalley for the review copy of this book.

A thought-provoking memoir on one former nun’s experiences in the church, what drew her to the clergy and why she ultimately left. Reminded me a bit of Educated.

Actual rating 2.5

Although I'm not religious, I found the premise to be interesting and obviously unusual, as one doesn't typically hear about nuns "escaping" their orders. Sadly, this book did not live up to expectations. Coldstream frequently comes across as not entirely sane, as evidenced by many of the choices she describes making, but at the same time, she appears to see herself as an exceptional person who is treated badly by virtually everyone she's surrounded by. The vibe that comes across is that even though she joined the order for herself, everyone else should be treating her like a queen for deigning to be there, and also why aren't you all doing things the way I do them? It's confusing and irritating in turns. I think there definitely were problems in her order, and that things went bad, but without hearing any other sides I'm unconvinced that the picture she's painted is entirely based in reality. It was disappointing, and a much longer read than it needed to be.

My thanks to St. Martin's Press, the author, and NetGalley for the opportunity to read this ARC in exchange for an honest opinion.

I grew up in a strict Catholic household, and as a teenager, considered joining the religious life and becoming a nun. I’ve read plenty of stories about women who became nuns, fascinated by the myriad reasons why they decided to do so. After losing my faith a few years ago and renouncing organized religion as a whole, I am more drawn to stories about people who have left Christianity (Catholicism in particular) and the religious life. This book was one of them, and I’m grateful to NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press for the opportunity to read an ARC.

The author became a Catholic after losing her beloved father at age 24, and then joined a Carmelite monastery in northern England. Her love for the beauty of the monastery’s natural surroundings and the religious life itself was evident in the first half of the book from her lush and poetic descriptions of her new home. Readers can easily picture themselves there, although Catholic terminology may be hard for some to grasp if they are not familiar with the religion.

Eventually, the politics and bullying from a clique of nuns within the order became too much for the author, and she ran away. The mother superior of the order even beat the author in her cell late one night. The author returned to the monastery a few weeks after running away, but would officially leave the order two years later, and embark on a new life as an academic and author.

Overall, I liked this book. The author described her life within the convent exceptionally well. I do feel like this memoir could read as a cautionary tale for people to be careful when making life-altering decisions in the wake of overwhelming grief. Additionally, although the author put the blame for what happened to her squarely on the shoulders of those evil, rogue nuns, she failed to examine how the religion she had joined fostered the cognitively dissonant atmosphere and conditions that led to this behavior in the first place.

I think this book was good. . The cast of characters was interesting and all so different from one another. I love the setting and environment this book created it really helped to create well rounded and dynamic characters

Catherine Coldstream’s “Cloistered” allows a glimpse into the world of monastics and their everyday lives through her own memoir. As she journeys through the process in becoming a nun, Coldstream faces challenges which often have root in overpowered higher-ups and misconceptions about others. In a monastery as secluded as the one she is in, it is not too surprising that trouble would eventually brewed.

At some point Coldstream must decide what is best for her, especially as time goes on and it becomes apparent things are changing (for the better or the worse).

I am not usually one for memoirs, however the premise captivated me as I, and others who have never had monastic experience, once hold the assumption that there was always an unchanging structure to the monastic life. I’ve always known there to be troubles within the church (especially considering my own denomination recently went through a rather nasty split), but I was surprised to see just how much could go wrong within a secluded community such as the Carmelite monastery.

I enjoyed this novel, even if I’m not the biggest fan of nonfiction or memoirs.

This is a memoir about a woman who wanted to become a cloistered Carmelite nun. She was following in a long tradition that stretches back to medieval times. Women became cloistered nuns in those days to, perhaps, escape marriage and find more freedoms, including intellectual ones. Catherine Coldstream had her own reasons.

She joined a community with such commitment and hope. Readers follow her experience there and discover, along with her, that life in a cloister does not always mean a life of peace. There are issues, power struggles, and conflicts. What will the author choose to do-stay or go? And, perhaps, more importantly why?

This is a compelling memoir and one that I recommend.

Many thanks to NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press for this title. All opinions are my own.

If you’ll allow me the indulgence to speak about the personal, one thing you might not know about me (unless you know me really, really well) is that I am involved with a Christian meditation group through my church on Monday evenings. My reasons for joining are private, but it’s always an experience to sit still and do nothing but chant the mantra “Maranatha” repeatedly for a good half-hour. (I participate over Zoom, but used to meet with the group in the chapel of my church — a lovely space that I miss — before the pandemic.) Even if you have a so-called “bad” session of mediation, you can always take something out of it. At the very least, if I go into meditation feeling anxious, chances are that I’ll be a lot calmer when the session is over. To that end, that’s why I picked up the book Cloistered for review. Though sent to me by a publicist blindly without me asking for it, the work was appealing because the memoir is about a Carmelite nun who took a vow of silence for 12 years. (I’m trying not to split hairs here in writing the previous sentence, but things are a little more complicated than that.) Something is appealing about living a life of contemplation, but it turns out there’s more to the story — and it needed to be told. Warning: some spoilers abound in the next paragraph.

The author describes joining a convent in northern England after the death of her elderly father. She was just 24 years old at the time. The reason for the connection is kept private, which is a little frustrating to the reader but is also paradoxically understandable. However, she joins as an enthusiastic novice. She spends the time between joining and taking her final vows of a life of obedience — a period that takes about four or five years — ranging her emotions from excited to lacking faith and thirsty for something more than just following directions and hiding her true emotions, which is what the leadership of the convent wants. The trouble ramps up after Coldstream takes her final vows. On becoming a full-fledged nun, Coldstream is then thrust into a world of political upheaval where a Mother Superior is trying to hold onto her power, though the cloister’s constitution doesn’t permit this. When a new Mother Superior is found — from a defunct monastery that folded into the one the author attended — the new Mother Superior is gaslit and bullied into relinquishing her power bit by bit. Coldstream, meanwhile, starts being bullied for having controversial views about teaching, openness, and wanting to read more philosophy, whereas the other nuns want her just to shut her mouth and go along with the flow. Finally, Coldstream is beaten viciously by one of her own, and then she flees the abbey during the nighttime to seemingly start a new life — though she comes back to the cloister for another two years, at which time she officially is devested of her vows.

Cloistered is a bit of a slow read at first. And it meanders. Coldstream does have the habit (pardon the pun) of talking about one subject, such as the abbey having an icloistnflux of feral housecats wandering around the abbey, to something completely different, such as the power structure of the monastery. However, the book picks up and builds momentum as you read it, gradually unfolding a history of bullying and abuse that is, at first, emotional in tone (Coldstream complains of loneliness) before graduating to the physical. In short, even if the pacing is glacial, this is a crucial and important story that needs to be told of other abuses in the Catholic Church that are anything but sexual. Though the incidents in this book took place some 20 to 30 years ago, it shines a light on human frailty within the church and the power that a marginalized group of women will do to hang on to. After all, being a Mother Superior, as it would turn out, is just one rung below being a bishop, which is only a few rungs away from being the Pope. The reader will be shocked to learn that communiques from the Vatican were suppressed to keep the sort of stability found in the abbey before the Second Vatican Council of the 1960s. In a sense, the women of the abbey that Coldstream is a part of have no interest in “getting with the times.” And, if they do, they are driven to the point of madness.

All in all, this insider’s look at life on the inside of a nunnery is interesting but it does take its time to get to its main points. However, the journey is just as important as the destination. The whole draw of this book is to show readers how the flame of enthusiasm for a life of following the divine can be gradually snuffed out. This is also the memoir of a life mostly spent on the inside of a convent — the outside world rarely intrudes (usually in the form of a visiting priest or monk from a neighbouring abbey) and only comes roaring into this book before Coldstream had joined the convent and after she has escaped from it. (To the latter end, Coldstream is baffled as to what to do with money when her sister gives her some upon reconnecting with her family after leaving the nunnery for the first time. She hadn’t handled any finances or paper bills in the years spent behind the convent’s walls.) In the end, Cloistered is a vital book for those always wondering what it would like to be a nun and those who want to learn of the dangers of the vocation before agreeing to sign up for it. This is worth reading but be prepared for something a little unfocused and something a little languidly paced. However, once you realize the double meaning of why nun’s bedrooms are referred to as cells, this will grip you and won’t let you shake loose. This is intriguing stuff in its own way and is worth meditating over.

This memoir covers Coldstream's experience as a cloistered nun in a Carmelite order, as well as the life experiences that led to her conversion to Catholicism and her taking refuge in a religious order; it also covers the increasing dysfunction in her community and her reasons for leaving. (It in fact begins with her dramatic escape and literal running away from the community; although she did return for some time after that night, we know from the beginning that she will be leaving dramatically and fearfully. I'm not sure this was the best structural decision for the memoir, but it does encourage the reader to maintain a sense of caution and detachment as Catherine immerses herself in the religious life. We know it's not going to last, even though Catherine is sure she is pledging her life to the community.)

The memoir is moving on the subject of silence, prayer, voices raised together in the choir, and the rhythms of convent life. It is also uncomfortably believable about the increasingly painful experiences of a community breaking down (take note of the midnight escape--this is not a soothing read). I'm sure the details of Carmelite theology will also work for some readers (they clearly matter to Coldstream).

Thanks to the publisher, author, and Netgalley for my free earc. My opinions are all my own.

Informative & Eye-Opening!
This is the story of Catherine Coldstream who converted to Catholicism after her father's death and was a Carmelite nun for twelve years.
During her time at the silent monastery she describes her intense personal journey of poverty, chastity and obedience in her enclosed life.
A profoundly moving memoir detailing her quest for God's love while enduring struggles, pain and the imperfections of humanity.

Thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for an arc of this novel in exchange for my honest review.

Catherine Coldstream spent twelve years in a Carmelite monastery with twenty nuns of a silent order. She believed she was entrusting herself to God, but she finds that, spending decades away from the outside world, the order has become subject to the cult of personality and has only itself to answer to. As the honeymoon phase of her new life wears off, she shares the negative effects of the harm done when institutional flaws go acknowledged and unpunished.

I am fascinated by the lives of nuns, both in antiquity and in modern times. I guess because we are often not privy to the lives of women who spend their lives with other women and outside of society. Catherine’s journey in the order and her separation from it is told in a heartfelt and authentic voice. These communities are so far removed from the rest of us that we don’t often know much about them, let alone deeper insight into their communities. This was a fascinating account, and I was happy to learn that the author found her own form of happiness after a difficult time with her life and faith in the institution.

Have you ever wondered what being a contemplative (as opposed to a teaching or nursing) nun is like? If so, Cloistered is the memoir for you.

Being shut into a convent year after year is definitely not for everyone. However, Catherine is drawn to the sisterhood in equal measures by her love of theology and her grief at her father’s death. She expects to find intelligent discourse. Instead, she finds something completely different. Has she joined a cult? A high school straight out of Mean Girls? The 2023 United States House of Representatives? Independent thought is considered disobedient. Bullying and shunning are common. How can Catherine reconcile her ideals with the all too human reality of a group of women living in a defined space?

Was Akenside, Catherine’s convent, just one aberrant place rather than the norm? That is the question left unanswered in Cloistered. I think the book does a good job presenting a balanced view of both the pros and cons of convent life. It definitely shows why Vatican II was necessary. But at its heart, it is one woman’s story. And a fascinating one at that. 5 stars!

Thanks to St. Martin’s Press and NetGalley for a digital review copy of the book.