I found this little prize stuck in the back corner of my library. I picked it up under a misguided assumption that it was about polygamy. Honestly I was in it for the dirty details. Polygamy is something I can't wrap my brain around and I was interested in what this book might entail.
The book happens to center around the murder of a young woman and her baby. Her husband's brothers and himself begin straying from the path of mainstream religion and become beyond fundamentalist. When one of them receives a revelation that she and a group of others must be exterminated because they are in the way of the work, the young woman and baby end up with their heads nearly severed in small town America.
Krakauer, in order to illustrate his point about the violent faith of fundamentalist, deems it necessary to pull forth the ugly past of the current LDS church. His writing style is gripping. He is a truly skilled writer and his historical and nonfiction accounts are made palatable by his gift of writing. On the other hand, from the blurb on the front cover until the last page, you are inundated with ugly and terrifying facts (?) that make a mainstream religion seem like its VERY ugly stepsister, the fundamentalists. Although some say that the distinction is clear between the LDS church and the other fundamentalist groups, including various polygamous sects, it really wasn't. Krakauer delves back to the roots of the LDS church. It is understandable why he does this. But his back and forth style, from past to present and right to left, leaves the lines blurred, and a harmless, God loving community pegged as the murderers and rapists next door.
I did enjoy Krakauer's skilled writing ability. I wasn't scared off by what I read. I am however saddened that a service and faith oriented religion is even spoken of in the same breath with the other crack job, spin offs. And I am sure as I say that, that those people probably shouldn't be pigeon holed either. Also the LDS religion's faith in God was basically ignored and replaced with the worship of Joseph Smith. Not at all factual in that instance.
Rating 4 for skill 2 for sticking to what should have been the main idea. It would be like me wanting to bring to light what I consider to be misdeeds of Catholics and going so far back in history that I drag in the Jews and turn on the spotlight.
Rating R Murder, rape, incest, drug abuse, language.
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