The author of The New York Times bestseller
Escape returns with a moving and inspirational tale
of her life after she heroically fled the cult she’d been
raised in, her hard-won new identity and happiness, and her
determination to win justice for the crimes committed
against her family. In 2003, Carolyn
Jessop, 35, 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. Jessop detailed the story of
her harrowing flight and the shocking conditions that
sparked it in her 2007 memoir,
Escape. Reveling in
her newfound identity as a bestselling author, a devoted
mom, and a loving companion to the wonderful man in her
life, Jessop thought she had put her past firmly behind
her.
Then, on April 3, 2008, it came roaring back in
full view of millions of television viewers across America.
On that date, 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, to which 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, Jessop once more was drawn
into the fray, this time as an expert called upon to help
authorities understand the customs and beliefs of the
extremist religious sect with which they were dealing.
In
Triumph, Jessop tells the real, and even
more harrowing, story behind the raid and sets the public
straight on much of the damaging misinformation that flooded
the media in its aftermath. She recounts the setbacks (the
tragic decision of the Supreme Court of Texas to allow the
children in state custody to return to their parents) as
well as the successes (the fact that evidence seized in the
raid is the basis for the string of criminal trials of FLDS
leaders that began in October 2009 and will continue
throughout 2010), all while weaving in details of her own
life since the publication of her first book. These include
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.
In the book’s second half, Jessop
shares with readers the sources of the strength that allowed
her not only to survive and eventually break free of FLDS
mind control, but also to flourish in her new life. The
tools of her transformation range from powerful female role
models (grandmothers on both sides) to Curves fitness clubs
(a secret indulgence that put her in touch with her body) to
her college education (rare among FLDS women). With her
characteristic honesty and steadfast sense of justice,
Jessop, a trained educator who taught elementary school for
seven years, shares her strong opinions on such
controversial topics as homeschooling and the need for the
court system to hold “deadbeat dads” accountable. (Among
Jessop’s recent victories is a court decision that ordered
her ex-husband to pay years of back child support.) An
extraordinary woman who has overcome countless challenges
and tragedies in her life, Jessop shows us in this book how,
in spite of everything, she has triumphed—and how you can,
too, no matter what adversity you face.
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