'Boy Erased' is a heartbreaking memoir about gay conversion therapy that you need to read

Sometimes the best way to move on from your past is to confront it head first. Or at least that's what Garrard Conley did with his book Boy Erased.

Boy Erased is a memoir about Conley's time in Love in Action, a 12-step ex-gay conversion therapy program. Conley joined the program when he was 19 years old, after he was raped in college. To protect himself, Conley's attacker outed Conley to his very religious family, including his father, who was a Baptist minister, giving Conley one very difficult choice to make: enter conversion therapy to be "cured" of becoming gay, or risk losing his family, church, and community.

"It took me a good 10 years before I felt comfortable even writing a word of it," explains Conley. "But I kept recognizing these patterns in my relationships. And I was like, 'Oh, maybe I haven't dealt with everything.' And then I was like, 'And probably there are a whole lot of other people who went through the same thing, and no one seems to have written a really nuanced book about it.'"

So that's what Conley set out to do. In Boy Erased, Conley tells the story of his time in conversion therapy, set side-by-side with his experience growing up in Arkansas, the way he tried to balance his religion and his sexuality, and his relationship with his family.

But what's especially striking about the book is the way that Conley writes with empathy and forgiveness about everything that he's experienced.

"I never wanted to write a book that had villains in it or monsters or grotesque people. I think the truth is much more powerful than that which is: Most of the players in this book were doing things out of love, which can be just as damaging as doing something out of hate if it's for the wrong reasons."

This week on the MashReads Podcast, we talk to Garrard Conley about his memoir Boy Erased. Join us in the episode above as we talk about Conley's experience, the impact of memoir, gay literature, and confronting shame.

Then, in honor of Gay Pride Month in June, we discuss our favorite queer books to celebrate Pride including: David Rackoff's essay "Arise, Ye Wretched of the Earth," Cassandra at the Wedding by Dorothy Baker, Fun Home by Alison Bechdel, and Ismat Chughtai's short story "Quilt."

Then, as always, we close the show with recommendations.

• Garrard recommends the new season of Twin Peaks. "It's like a crime procedural drama but it goes way left field ... it makes no sense but it's beautiful."

• MJ recommends "Unexpected video game horses, ranked," a story from Mashable's esports reporter Kellen Beck that ranks all of the weird, random horses that pop up in video games. "It is so weird and so funny ... I was laughing on the subway while reading it."

Next week we are reading and discussing Into The Water by Paula Hawkins. We hope you'll join us. And if you're looking for even more book news, don't forget to follow MashReads on Facebook and Twitter.