Fool Me Once

Melody Joy, an ordinary Mormon wife in an ordinary Mormon marriage, is doing her best to juggle the responsibilities of being a wife and mother while attending law school and trying to build a career that will let her serve others while providing for her family. Melody's church involvement is minimal these days, but she hasn't given up her beliefs. She just can't do everything at once. Melody's husband, Walter Bainbridge, is an ordinary Mormon man. He has worked for years to earn a Ph.D. and secure a university teaching position. His schooling has pulled him away from active church involvement and put a strain on his relationship with Melody, but they've both held on, waiting for the fast-approaching day when he would finally earn tenure and secure a permanent post in his profession. Enter Lacey: six feet of youthful strawberry blonde, long-legged, bored-with-her-own-husband mid-life-crisis distraction. Suddenly, the marriage vows Walter made to Melody two decades earlier go out the window, Melody goes a little (maybe a lot) ballistic over the treachery, and the Provence-Bainbridges are at an impasse: Walter wants to have his cake and eat it too, the church discourages divorce, Melody doesn't want to do jail time, and she can't afford a hit-man. What other options are left when your fairy-tale marriage is in serious trouble? This provocative memoir-style novel is part one of a three-part sorta-biography that reads much like *Educated* (Tara Westover) or *Escape* (Carolyn Jessup) or *Confessions of a Latter-day Virgin* (Nicole Hardy). *Fool Me Once* will pull you in, keep you turning the page, and leave you wondering how two such well-matched people could end up so far apart, how they will ever figure out their problems, and how they will manage to keep from killing each other in the process. A word from the author: If this story sounds familiar, that's because it is. This is the story of one Mormon couple's married life before #MeToo. I write about Mormons because that's the culture I know best. MJ could have been a member of any church, anywhere. She just happens to be LDS. When I started writing these books, I had no idea the problem of bishops asking sexual questions in worthiness issues was as pervasive as it apparently is. All I knew is what I had experienced personally. Such interviews factor into the story here, and while MJ's experience was not as horrifying as that of many others, it still impacted her life in some significant and damaging ways. This practice needs to stop. No sexual questions, ever, for anyone. #protectLDSchildren MC