Tuesday 14 December 2010

Jessop, Carolyn "Escape"

Jessop, Carolyn "Escape" - 2007

Imagine being forced into a marriage at the age of 18 to a man 32 years older than you. Imagine further that you are wife no. 4 with more following. That you have eight children in fifteen years which you share with the other wives. That you have to obey your husband. That he abuses you and your children. What would you do?

Carolyn Jessop is the woman who experienced exactly this. She did the only thing possible, she escaped. This is the story of her life, an account of a woman in a completely destitute position who fought for her life and that of her children.

Even though this is a book about one terrible thing after another, it is also a book of hope, that there is something you can do in a hopeless situation, where everyone tells you it's impossible to get away from but it shows there is hope. I have nothing but admiration for this woman.

From the back cover:

"In the closed world of the fundamentalist Church of Latter Day Saints. Carolyn Jessop was forced to obey HER Controlling husband's every Demand. She had no money. No power and existed AS one of six wives battling for her husband's attention. For seventeen years Carolyn suffered for the sake of her children. She tried to protect them as the cult's new leader. Warren Jeffs. started marrying girls off younger and younger. But when Carolyn discovered that her twelve-year-old daughter had spent three days at Jeffs' home. she knew she had to do everything in her power to take her children and flee. At 35 Carolyn escaped. This is her harrowing - and ultimately triumphant - story."

Another book about the FLDS (which I didn't really like very much):
Krakauer, Jon "Under the Banner of Heaven: A Story of Violent Faith"

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