Sears, “The Sister Preachers” (Reviewed by Michelle Llewellyn)

Title: The Sister Preachers
Author: Gale Sears
Publisher: Deseret Book
Genre: Historical fiction
Year Published: 2022
Number of Pages: 265

Reviewed by Michelle Llewellyn

I had the opportunity to meet Gale Sears at a Deseret Book grand opening on a blazing hot Saturday, and she signed my copy of this book. I told her I was right in the middle of reading it and was loving it! Definitely her best book especially compared to all her other works of historical fiction. I then commended her thorough researching skills, one of the things I enjoy most about her books. She agreed that reading about true characters who actually lived was what made this book better than her previous ones (she’s been a published author since 1997) which always featured at least one or two fictional characters based on real people. The Sister Preachers has no fictional characters at all, the entire story is based on real events that happened to real people. There are footnotes at the end of many of the chapters where the author explains what was true and what she took some literary license with. She’s never done footnotes before and I especially enjoyed that part of the book best.

Saints, Volume 3 also has a few short paragraphs about Jennie Brimhall and Inez Knight, the first official unmarried sister missionaries as we think of them today who were called to serve for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. However, Jennie and Inez’s story in Saints are given nowhere near as much detail as in this book. Reading The Sister Preachers also brought back many of my own fond memories of joking around with and enjoying many P-day activities with the Elders when I served my own mission to Atlanta, Georgia in the late 1990’s (am I really that old?).

Atlanta, Georgia is a far cry from northern England, where these sisters served but anyone who has served a mission for the Church will still be able to relate, elder and sister alike. An LDS mission is not always like that old church video Labor of Love (remember that one?). The 1990’s elder flying home from his mission where he could hardly swing a dead cat without hitting a golden investigator, baptizing that person, and becoming their best friend for life? If only everyone’s mission could be so innocent and carefree! This book did not spare the gory details of physical violence and outright persecution these two sisters faced while serving the Lord and I appreciated that. I may not have endured garbage and rocks thrown at me or a meeting hall vandalized by an attacking mob but Satan’s opposition to the work knows no time limits or bounds. The reader must remember there is always good to be found somewhere. And there are always sweet connections with investigators to balance out the bad. Always. And these two sisters get those experiences too. That’s why I enjoyed reading this so much. It brought back many mission memories of my own.

I’ll admit at times I kept getting these two sisters confused in the author’s narrative. Which one was engaged to the elder who also happened to be serving in this same mission? Which one had a brother serving a mission here as well? More physical description of Jennie and Inez would’ve been helpful but both sisters were equally fun to read about, their love for each other as best friends and their constant enthusiasm and finding the humor in every situation they found themselves in (which the author took directly from their journals and letters home to Salt Lake). I found this book to be a page turner and did not want it to end.

Which is why I was also disappointed at the abrupt ending. I would like to have followed at least one of them home to Salt Lake and the “decompression period” every return missionary goes through after returning home. The shock of returning to normal life and the number one question asked of you the minute you take off that black name tag…”So, when are you getting married?”

Oh well, I guess Gale can’t be expected to write about everything that comes with missionary life but more books and stories about sister missionaries in the Church need to be written and told. There are fun English recipes at the end of some chapters in this book too and while I do enjoy cooking I probably won’t attempt making any of these dishes. Not even the chocolate cream (169) which calls for six eggs and a long process of whipping and setting the mixture in a pot of boiling water and then straining it into the mold to set. Give me a box of Jell-O no bake chocolate cheesecake mix any day!