Holy Ghost Girl

A Memoir

By: Donna M. Johnson

Narrated by: Carrington MacDuffie

A compassionate, humorous story of faith, betrayal, and coming of age on the sawdust trail.

She was just three years old when her mother signed on as the organist of tent revivalist David Terrell, and before long, Donna Johnson was part of the hugely popular evangelical preacher’s inner circle. At seventeen, she left the ministry for good, with a trove of stranger-than-fiction memories. A homecoming like no other, Holy Ghost Girl brings to life miracles, exorcisms, and faceoffs with the Ku Klux Klan - and that’s just what went on under the tent.

As Terrell became known worldwide during the 1960s and ’70s, the caravan of brokendown cars and trucks that made up his ministry evolved into fleets of Mercedes and airplanes. The glories of the Word mixed with betrayals of the flesh, and Donna’s mother bore Terrell’s children in one of several secret households he maintained. Thousands of followers, dubbed “Terrellites” by the press, left their homes to await the end of the world in cultlike communities. Jesus didn’t show, but the IRS did, and the prophet-healer went to prison.

Recounted with deadpan observations and surreal detail, Holy Ghost Girl bypasses easy judgment to articulate a rich world where the mystery of faith and human frailty share a surprising and humorous coexistence.

Donna Johnson has written about religion for the Dallas Morning News and the Austin American Statesman. She won the Mayborn Creative Nonfiction Prize for Manuscript in Progress in 2007 for Holy Ghost Girl.

©2011 Donna Johnson (P)2011 Blackstone Audio, Inc.

Critic reviews

“What a life!…Donna Johnson sorts through her story with great insight, compassion, and humor.” (Jeannette Walls, New York Times best-selling author of The Glass Castle)

loved the humor elements.

loved it! i love the humor in it. Only thing is wanted to know more details about what happened to individuals at the end.

Read it four times

Outstanding book, objective as she could possibly be. For an ex-Christian, this book helped me voice a lot of things I struggled with as a child.

Facinating, compassionate and compelling.

A story that will stay with you. This true story pulled me in and kept me hooked. It does a great job of showing you the inside of the traveling revival world, the personalities and motivations, the complexity. The story is told with honesty and compassion. Although much damage was done along the way, especially to the kids involved , the story ends with the families coming together with love and forgiveness.

An intriguing memoir with a dash of Pentecostal history.

As I sit here bawling through the last chapter I decided I had to leave a review. This was an “I’m just looking for something to read” selection. I quickly was engaged by the Holy Ghost Girl narrator’s story made even more vivid by the wonderful narrator. While the writing is exceptional, I have to believe I was more enchanted by listen to this wonderful performance than if I simply read it. Unusual topic? Pentecostal history? Revivals, healings and tents? DO NOT let any of that put you off reading this book. 5 stars!

Interesting....

This book gives one the behind the scenes look at the religious tent events. This one Minister seems authentic in his healing powers but a zealous none the less.
It brings to mind the quote "Do as I say, not as I do". The minister can sin by their own interpretation of the bible as justification but no one else can by doing the same. It is the children of the staff that suffer. The "Holy Ghost Child" gives brilliant insight into the life of a child who suffered through the Evangelist Tent Services.