How long does it take to read Beyond Belief?
My Secret Life Inside Scientology and My Harrowing Escape
Jenna Miscavige Hill, Lisa Pulitzer
Beyond Belief by Jenna Miscavige Hill, Lisa Pulitzer takes about 7 hours 38 minutes to read at 250 words a minute.
About 7 hours 38 minutes
A weekend read
First published 2013. 416 pages, about 114,400 words.
16 days at 30 minutes a day
Estimate based on 275 words per page.
At other speeds
| Slow, 150 words a minute | 12 hours 43 minutes |
| Average, 250 words a minute | 7 hours 38 minutes |
| Fast, 400 words a minute | 4 hours 46 minutes |
The page count is the median across 7 editions, so your copy may differ. How we calculate.
About the book
Jenna Miscavige Hill was raised to obey. As the niece of the Church of Scientology's leader David Miscavige, she grew up at the center of this highly controversial and powerful organization. But at twenty-one, Jenna made a daring break, risking everything she had ever known and loved to leave Scientology once and for all. Now she speaks out about her life, the Church, and her dramatic escape, going deep inside a religion that, for decades, has been the subject of fierce debate and speculation worldwide. Piercing the veil of secrecy that has long shrouded the world of Scientology, this insider reveals unprecedented firsthand knowledge of the religion, its obscure rituals, and its mysterious leader—David Miscavige. From her prolonged separation from her parents as a small child to being indoctrinated to serve the greater good of the Church, from her lack of personal freedoms to the organization's emphasis on celebrity recruitment, Jenna goes behind the scenes of Scientology's oppressive and alienating culture, detailing an environment rooted in control in which the most devoted followers often face the harshest punishments when they fall out of line. Addressing some of the Church's most notorious practices in startling detail, she also describes a childhood of isolation and neglect—a childhood that, painful as it was, prepared her for a tough life in the Church's most devoted order, the Sea Org. Despite this hardship, it is only when her family approaches dissolution and her world begins to unravel that she is finally able to see the patterns of stifling conformity and psychological control that have ruled her life. Faced with a heartbreaking choice, she mounts a courageous escape, but not before being put through the ultimate test of family, faith, and love. At once captivating and disturbing, Beyond Belief is an eye-opening exploration of the limits of religion and the lengths to which one woman went to break free.
Subjects: Scientology, Hill, Jenna Miscavige, Scientologists, Church of Scientology International, Ex-church members, Biography
