Son of a Preacher Man: My Search for Grace in the Shadows

From the opening epigram (a passage from Romans about learning from trials and adversities) to the rousing concluding chapter, this memoir by the son of the scandal-ridden televangelists Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker inspires, captivates and entertains. Even before his dad was arrested, Jay confesses, family life began to fall apart: Mom was addicted to drugs, and Jay's 16-year-old sister ran off to marry her beau. And then, in a haze of scandal, his father, whom Jay lionizes, was sentenced in 1989 to 45 years in prison. Jay's portrait of Papa Bakker is extremely sympathetic--at times, a tad too worshipful. He also includes a touching vignette about Jimmy Swaggart, who agreed to help Jay get his father's prison sentence reduced when no other big-name pastors dared to intervene. In the years since his father was released from prison, young Jay Bakker has discovered he's an alcoholic, and gotten sober; fallen in love, and gotten married; and realized he's a sinner, and gotten right with God. He's now a pastor--a tattooed, hip pastor--in Atlanta, ministering to street youth on skateboards. Readers are sure to love Bakker's delightfully down-to-earth, slightly self-mocking tone (""For a while I thought I was Jim Morrison,"" he says about his acid-tripping, cowboy-boot-sporting days in high school), and will hope he'll somehow carve out time to write more books. (Feb.)