Butterfield, R. C. (2012). The secret thoughts of an unlikely convert: An English professor’s journey into Christian faith (2nd ed.). Crown and Covenant. Rosaria Champagne Butterfield earned her PhD in English Literature from Ohio State University, then served in the English department and women's studies program at Syracuse University from 1992 to 2002. She describes herself as "homeschool mother, author, and speaker." She begins, "When I was 28 years old, I boldly declared myself lesbian.. . . At the age of 36, I was one of the few tenured women at a large university. I had become one of the 'tenured radicals.'" Her primary academic field was critical theory, specializing in queer theory. Her historical focus was 19th-century literature, informed by Freud, Marx, and Darwin. While at Syracuse, she advised the LGBTQ+ student group, wrote policies related to same-sex couples, and actively lobbied for LGBTQ+ issues with her lesbian partner. This memoir describes her spiritual journey as she dialogues with Pastor Ken Smith of the Syracuse Reformed Presbyterian Church who wrote her a letter in response to an article she wrote critiquing the gender politics of Promise Keepers. She noted, "He and his wife invited her to dinner - "not to scapegoat me, but to listen and to learn and to dialogue. . . . We didn't debate worldview, we talked about our personal truth." She later converted to Christianity. The ease with which a Christian community talks about 'accepting Christ' belies the real challenges associated with conversion...loss of community, confusion about identity, unclear terminology, lack of full embrace and acceptance into the Christian community.. She described this as "traumatic." On another level, this book is about knowing and thinking. Butterfield noted: "Christians always seemed like bad thinkers to me. . . . bad readers. . . . [bringing] the Bible into a conversation to stop the conversation, not deepen it" (p. 4). She goes into detail describing her sense making of the Scriptures and how that hermeneutic influences her worldview. She proposed 3 life lessons: 1) When you don't know what to do, go back to the basics; 2) Speak the truth, because you never know who is listening; and 3) It's better to be wrong on an important subject than right on a trivial one, as long as you are willing to learn from your mistakes. This left me thinking a great deal about how the importance of modeling relational Christianity. Rather than judgment and labeling, this idea of asking questions about what and why a person believes what they do. Sincere curiosity and an ethic of care are far better stances. This highlighted how challenging conversion is and the importance of creating safe spaces for people to connect, dialogue, and simply be. Those interested in epistemology, hermeneutics, knowing, transformation, conversion and identity; pastors and church leaders; those who like biographies should read this book.