"Escape" book about polygamy

[javacat]

::waves hello:: I'm back! Hi! Oh, you didn't know I was gone? Heh, that's okay. I was off having fun.

So!  I'm reading (on books on tape) "Escape" by Carolyn Jessop and it's fascinating. She was the 4th wife of Merril Jessop, was assigned to him in marriage at age 17, managed to get a college degree & create a true self while having 8 children and putting up with all kinds of BS and sometimes outright abuse at the hands of her husband and some of her sister-wives before fleeing the FLDS with all 8 of her children.

 

Titles on the subject:  "Escape", "Shattered Dreams"  "Daughter of the Saints", “Favorite Wife”

 

http://polygamyabuse.org/default.aspx

Photo on the main page is of Carolyn and Merril Jessop

 

This site has links to many articles about the book Escape and Carolyn Jessop: 

http://childbrides.org/carolyn.html

 

An ex-member of the Fundamentalist LDS Church suggests the best way to reduce the negative effects of polygamy is to decriminalize it.

Carolyn Jessop made those comments in an interview posted on the Web site for the "Oprah Winfrey Show."

"If there was a way to decriminalize it, people could live honestly and in the open and with dignity and their children could be more mainstreamed. Then the children would have more options," Jessop said in her interview with Winfrey, published on oprah.com and scheduled to be broadcast on today at 4 p.m. on KUTV.

 

http://ca.youtube.com/watch?v=jJAvqc5u9KM

Carolyn Jessop speaking at The Tattered Cover. 8 minutes. 

Author Carolyn Jessop describes her escape from the FLDS, an ultra-fundamentalist offshoot of the Mormon Church.

 

http://www.bankingonheaven.com/

BANKING ON HEAVEN is the inside story of the largest polygamous enclave in the United States, written, produced, and narrated by Laurie Allen, who escaped a similar polygamous sect. BANKING ON HEAVEN reveals what happens behind closed doors in the FLDS, including the YFZ (Yearning for Zion) Ranch in Texas.

 

http://www.childbrides.org/  (Supported by The United Way)

he HOPE Organization is a St. George, Utah based 501(c)(3) charity providing assistance to individuals and families to safely transition from a polygamous lifestyle into mainstream society.

 

 

http://blogs.sltrib.com/plurallife/2007/10/carolyn-jessops-escape.htm  - a start to the “Polygamy Files” reportage.  Brooke Adams covers polygamy for The Salt Lake Tribune. Her reporting on the issue has won numerous awards.

 

 

http://sixldswriters.blogspot.com/2008/07/carolyn-jessops-escape.html

… So many things made me upset. How beliefs that I have that are precious and sacred to me have been twisted and perverted. How men use their "faith" to abuse their wives and their children, to be mini-dictators and tyrants in their homes. 

… I am so grateful that that there are people like Dan Fischer who was there to help Carolyn when she needed it (via The Diversity Foundation).

… But if you've ever wanted a first-hand account of someone who lived the FLDS way of life, this is the book to read.

 

From Comments:

One very similar book I have read recently is called What Peace There May Be, by Susanna Barlow. I love the way the story is told from the child's perspective. I am definitely recommending it.

 

One Lost Boy …  is the story of a teenage boy who ran away from polygamy. I was expecting the usual definition of that term; the boys who have been expelled from the community. It's written from an interesting perspective and gives a sad picture of why so many women and children stay in a male dominated and selfish lifestyle. [T]he book isn't fiction …  It does a much better job than Don't Marry the Mormon Boys of explaining that there are deep and multiple differences between polygamous sects and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

 

Curious about Polygamy?

Hear what it's like from within. Real stories about life. Anonymous.

www.ExperienceProject.com

 

 

http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/Judge_orders_FLDS_leaders_bride_into_state_custody.html

A judge here ordered the child bride of polygamist sect leader Warren Jeffs to be placed in state custody Tuesday, saying she feared the girl's mother [Barbara Jessop] was unable to protect her. "Allowing the child to remain (in her mother's custody) would be contrary to the interests of the girl," said state District Judge Barbara Walther.

 

Walther, however, denied a request by Child Protective Services for custody of the girl's 11-year-old brother and ordered that he remain with his mother. The judge ordered that neither child be allowed contact with their father, Frederick "Merril" Jessop, also a sect leader.

 

CPS attorneys argued that Barbara Jessop had displayed an unwillingness to protect her children from abuse and therefore should lose temporary custody of them. The daughter was "spiritually married" to the group's prophet, Warren Jeffs when she was 12 and he was 50.

 

 

http://www.rickross.com/reference/polygamy/polygamy712.html

For most tourists headed to the Caliente Hot Springs Motel and Spa, the main draw is the hot mineral water piped into the rooms.

Jessop's husband, Merrill Jessop, and her father, Nathan Jessop, bought the motel in late 1997. For the next seven years it was the site of many secretive nuptials, said Carolyn Jessop, who escaped the sect with her eight children in 2003.

The Jessops sold the motel in 2004 to a Las Vegas company.

 

FLDS ties to Lincoln County extend beyond the Caliente Hot Springs Motel. Two hours north on U.S. Highway 93 is Atlanta Farms, where FLDS members cultivate 3,000 acres of hay, alfalfa and potatoes. The harvest is shipped across the nation, with many of the potatoes produced by the Lincoln County farm ending up as hash browns served to tourists at Las Vegas casinos, said Sam Brower, a private investigator who has spent years probing the secretive church.

 

Heigl to star in movie based on ex-FLDS member's book

Deseret News Originally published Wednesday, June 11, 2008

"Gray's Anatomy" actress Katherine Heigl will star in a feature film adaptation of Carolyn Jessop's best-selling book "Escape," about her life within the Fundamentalist LDS Church.  The Hollywood-industry newspaper Variety reported Tuesday that Heigl will also produce the film. Jessop's book, about her life as the fourth wife of FLDS leader Merrill Jessop and her decision to leave the polygamous sect, has been a huge bestseller.  It is not the only film in development about the FLDS Church.  Variety previously reported that "Stolen Innocence" would be made into a movie.  That book was written by Elissa Wall, the witness in the case against FLDS leader Warren Jeffs.