Best Selling Books by Carolyn Jessop

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • The dramatic true story of one woman’s life inside the ultra-fundamentalist American religious sect featured in Keep Sweet: Pray and Obey—and her courageous flight to freedom with her eight children With a new epilogue by the author • “Escape provides an astonishing look behind the tightly drawn curtains of the FLDS church, one of the most secretive religious groups in the United States. A courageous, heart-wrenching account.”—Jon Krakauer When she was eighteen years old, Carolyn Jessop was coerced into an arranged marriage with a total stranger: a man thirty-two years her senior. Merril Jessop already had three wives. But arranged plural marriages were an integral part of Carolyn’s heritage: She was born into and raised in the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (FLDS), the radical offshoot of the Mormon Church. Over the next fifteen years, Carolyn had eight children and withstood her husband’s psychological abuse and the watchful eyes of his other wives, who were locked in a constant battle for supremacy. Carolyn was miserable for years and wanted out, but she knew that if she tried to leave and got caught, her children would be taken away from her. In 2003, Carolyn chose freedom over fear and fled her home with her eight children. She had $20 to her name. Escape exposes a world tantamount to a prison camp, created by religious fanatics who, in the name of God, deprive the followers the right to make choices, brainwash children in church-run schools, and force women to be totally subservient to men. Against this background, Carolyn’s flight takes on an extraordinary, inspiring power. Not only did Carolyn manage a daring escape from a brutal environment, she became the first woman ever granted full custody of her children in a contested suit involving the FLDS. And in 2006, her reports to the Utah attorney general on church abuses formed a crucial part of the case that led to the arrest, and later the conviction and sentence, of their notorious leader, Warren Jeffs.

A moving and inspirational true story of one woman’s life after fleeing the ultra-fundamentalist American religious sect featured in Keep Sweet: Pray and Obey—from the New York Times bestselling author of Escape “Triumph is thoughtful, intelligent, and engaging.”—Meg Wolitzer, bestselling author of The Interestings In 2003, Carolyn Jessop, a lifelong member of the extremist Mormon sect the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (FLDS), gathered up her eight children, including her profoundly disabled four-year-old son, and escaped in the middle of the night to freedom. After detailing the shocking conditions of FLDS and her harrowing flight in her memoir, Escape, Carolyn reveled in her newfound identity as a bestselling author, a devoted mom, and a loving companion to the wonderful man in her life. She thought she had put her past firmly behind her. Then, on April 3, 2008, it came roaring back when the state of Texas, acting on a tip from a young girl who’d called a hotline alleging abuse, staged a surprise raid on the Yearning for Zion Ranch, a sprawling, 1700-acre compound near Eldorado, Texas, where the jailed FLDS “prophet” Warren Jeffs had relocated his sect’s most “worthy” members three years earlier. The ranch was being run by Merril Jessop, Carolyn’s ex-husband and one of the cult’s most powerful leaders. As a mesmerized nation watched the crisis unfold, Carolyn was called upon as an expert to help authorities understand the customs and beliefs of the extremist religious sect. In Triumph, Carolyn tells the real, harrowing story behind the raid and sets the record straight on much of the damaging misinformation that flooded the media in its aftermath. She recounts the setbacks and the successes, all while weaving in details of her own life in the years since her escape—including her budding role as a social critic and her struggle to make peace with her eldest daughter’s heartbreaking decision to return to the cult. An extraordinary woman who has overcome countless challenges and tragedies in her life, Carolyn shows us in this book how she has triumphed in spite of everything—and how you can, too, no matter what adversity you face.

In de greep van een sekte Aangrijpend en inspirerend In de besloten wereld van de Fundamentalistische Kerk van Jezus Christus van de Heiligen der Laatste Dagen (FHLD) is Carolyn Jessop gedwongen om aan elke eis van haar overheersende echtgenoot te voldoen. Ze heeft geen geld, geen macht en is slechts een van de zes vrouwen die vechten om de aandacht van hun echtgenoot. Zeventien jaar lang ondergaat Carolyn deze vernedering in het belang van haar kinderen. Ze probeert hen te beschermen wanneer de nieuwe sekteleider Warren Jeffs meisjes op steeds jongere leeftijd laat trouwen. Maar als Carolyn ontdekt dat haar twaalfjarige dochter drie dagen in Jeffs huis heeft verbleven, weet ze dat ze alles in het werk moet stellen om te vluchten en haar kinderen mee te nemen.

Carolyn Blackmore wird in eine Polygamistensekte hineingeboren, in der Frauen keine Rechte haben und den Männern gehorchen müssen. Da diese Gesellschaft mit ihren frauenverachtenden Strukturen von klein auf das Einzige ist, was sie kennt, stellt Carolyn sie niemals in Frage. Bis sie mit 18 dazu gezwungen wird, den 50-jährigen Merril Jessop zu heiraten. In den folgenden 15 Jahren teilt sie Haus und Mann mit insgesamt sechs weiteren Frauen und bekommt selbst acht Kinder. Der Bevormundung und den brutalen Schikanen ihres Ehemanns und der anderen Frauen hilflos ausgeliefert, hält Carolyn es nicht mehr aus. In ihrer Verzweiflung bleibt ihr nur ein Ausweg: Bei Nacht und Nebel wagt sie mit ihren Kindern die Flucht.