Carolyn Jessop describes her life growing up in the sect known as the Fundamental Church of Latter Day Saints, a breakaway fractions of the Mormon church. The Mormons had to give up plural marriages if they wanted Utah to become a state of the United States. The people who refused to give up polygamy, continued to practice in secret initially and letter formed the FLDS.
She was born into polygamy and at the age of 18, was told that the prophet had a vision and she was to marry Merril Jessop, a man 50 years old who was to become very influential in the FLDS. She had to give up her dream of becoming a doctor. They did allow her to study to become a teacher which would be an asset later in life. She became this man's 4th wife and had 8 kids from him. He was brutal and inconsiderate. In the FLDS, the children belonged to all the mothers and anyone could discipline any of the kids. Merril allowed his favorite wife to discipline the children and did not care if she physically and/or mentally abused them. Carolyn soon realized that the only way to garner favors from her husband and protect her children was by making sure she was always available and willing to please her husband sexually.
After 6 children, she started questioning her faith and was starting to consider escaping from her husband and the FLDS. It was a hard decision since it was the only thing she knew and she was always told that the outside world was evil and if she left, when she died she would go to hell. On the other hand, she was also told that if she was an obedient wife and gave her husband many children, she would spend celestial eternety with her husband, his many wives and all the children. She figured there was no way celestial hell could be any worse than spending the rest eternity with a man she despised.
By the time she succeed in escaping with the help of a brother and sister as well as a former couple which used to belong to the FLDS, she became one of the first women, if not the first woman to escape with all of her 8 children, one being severely handicapped. By the time she escaped, her husband had 6 other wives and a total 54 children.
This is one of the best books on polygamy and more specifically, the FLDS. It is the story of the courage of one woman to save herself and her children from a life of misery, abuse, ignorance.
I highly recommend it.