| Book review - Stolen Innocence, Elissa Wall and Lisa Pulitzer | |
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By Stephen Davenport The Independent Weekly - Adelaide, South Australia | |
Warren Jeffs was the leader in the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, a polygamous sect which has been accused of widespread child abuse. A raid on Jeffs’s ranch in Texas resulted in the removal of hundreds of children from their homes and thrust the church’s practices into the spotlight. Arguably the darkest secret of the sect unfurls at a secluded motel in Nevada, where girls as young as 14 are forced into wedlock. Elissa Wall claims she was one such under age bride and had no choice but to marry her 19-year-old first cousin Allen Steed. In Stolen Innocence: My Story of Growing Up in a Polygamous Sect, Becoming a Teenage Bride, and Breaking Free of Warren Jeffs, Wall tells her story. Her vivid account of the sect’s behaviour is by turns shocking, bewildering, harrowing and compelling. Wall emerges as a courageous and credible woman who testifies against a twisted criminal. However, it is her childhood perceptions on life and the harsh realities in a closed community that prove to be the most haunting and inspirational. She discusses her turbulent youth, her family’s devotion and Warren Jeffs’s influence over the church. Then she reveals the truth about her marriage. Insisting that it was her duty to submit to his every desire, Allen nightly raped his bride Wall found the strength to break free and give evidence against her husband and the church. Stolen Innocence is not simply the autobiography of a woman who managed to escape from her religion. This spirited memoir is a tad self-serving but it’s also the story of a woman who fought to control her own body and mind, and reclaimed what was rightfully hers – the power of choice. Readers will find this book both fascinating and terribly moving. HarperCollins RRP $29.99 | |
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IndependentWeekly.com Originally published July 28, 2008 | |
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