Alyne Tamir is a content creator who has now authored the book, "Dear Alyne: My Years as a Married Virgin." In this book, Tamir details her childhood in which she goes through her parents' divorce and then her mother's growing obsession with the Mormon church. As a result, her father returns to his home country of Israel and Tamir becomes further entrenched in the Mormon faith. As a teenager, she was so proud of how well she followed all the rules, but the consequences of that weren't seen until she was married very young and began experiencing problems in her marriage. Even before she was married, she knew instinctually that she shouldn't be getting married

Tamir was very open about the ways her upbringing contributed to the problems in her marriage, particularly the sexual problems. However, both Tamir and her husband came across as very immature. And once divorced, Tamir continued making bad choices and living selfishly. While I appreciated her honesty and candor, Tamir was hard to like or root for. Thanks to NetGalley for the ARC. All opinions are my own.

I had never heard of Alyne Tamir prior to reading this book. My interest was based on her ex-Mormon status as I have read numerous books in that genre. Hers was a very refreshing voice and she can be very humorous. However, she addresses a very sensitive issue with complete honesty and frankness: the sexual difficulties she experienced in her marriage. She attributes these issues to her Mormon upbringing, which allowed for very little sexual experience prior to marriage.....as if that's a switch you can turn off/on. I found myself hoping she could resolve the issue since she appeared to truly love her husband, but ultimately she divorced him and moved on to other relationships. In the end I was happy to read that she was able to find herself and build her own happiness.

2 stars.

A book by a “content creator” did not sound like it was made for the likes of me but I’ve always been fascinated by Mormons and I was interested to see what this woman had to say about growing up in the faith….and what came after.

Tamir was a childhood loner and goes somewhat into her background as the daughter of a blonde Mormon and an Israeli Jew. Her parents divorced when she was 11, her father returned to Israel and has not been back to the U.S. since, so she spent her summers with him there, becoming fluent in Hebrew. She spills a fair amount about growing up Mormon, including things she’s not supposed to reveal, like the goings on inside the temple. That was interesting. However she continually states the obvious (or maybe not, since she’s targeting an entirely different demographic and maybe they are…um, dumber?) and the writing is fairly sophomoric. Others may like this better, but my first instincts were correct, this wasn’t for me.

This may be a better read for people familiar with the author or curious about Mormon culture. It is a fine memoir but I didn’t find it particularly compelling.