Loose Cannons by Diana Cannon-Ragsdale Is A Story Of Survival In A Dysfunctional Mormon Family

“Loose Cannons is an unforgettable memoir, a remarkable and astonishing story which will leave you laughing, crying, and cringing until the last page.” —Warren Driggs, author of Mormon Boy, Deep Water and Tortoise in the Road

The 411:

Kudos to Diana Cannon-Ragsdale for putting her difficult childhood and upbringing into words.

Loose Cannons is a sometimes emotional, heartbreaking, disturbing look into how dysfunctional family life is for way too many. We have no idea what goes on behind closed doors and being able to survive childhood trauma, young adulthood drama and even the baggage we carry into adulthood is commendable.

Some families have dark secrets be kind to one another because you have no idea what some people are going through.

ABOUT THE BOOK 

Loose Cannons (Legacy Launch Pad, May 4, 2022) In Salt Lake City, Utah, Diana Cannon Ragsdale’s family was a Mormon dynasty with ancestors who were contemporaries of Brigham Young—and they had many dark secrets to keep. Growing up at the mercy of her mother’s depression and father’s undiagnosed schizophrenia, Diana and her five siblings were left to fend for themselves as their mom and dad rotated in and out of psychiatric hospitals and police custody. Finally, in 1966, Diana’s mother left her family and the Mormon Church to start a new relationship with a woman, sending Diana’s father into a tailspin. In Loose Cannons, Diana traces her rebellious 1970’s girlhood— amidst her father’s multiple suicide attempts and remarriage to her mother’s sister. As she and her siblings barreled into adulthoods they weren’t ready for, they tried to rely on each other while reproducing broken relationships of their own. Eventually, after several divorces and while raising three children of her own, Diana reconnected with her estranged mother and inherited a lifetime’s worth of her journals. After decades spent searching for answers, her mother’s writing about swinger’s parties, sexual abuse, ancient wounds and broken attempts at happiness reframed everything Diana thought she knew about her family and herself. A debut memoir like no other, Loose Cannons is a harrowing and hilarious saga spanning more than 60 years of multigenerational trauma and dysfunction—and the spiritual power it took to overcome it all.