There Are A Thousand Sides to Every Story

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Julia Scheeres fleshes out the Jonestown story as only a person with a past history like hers could.  Ms Scheeres spent her childhood in an isolated religious community.  She doesn't approach this oft told history by  trying to explain what was wrong with these people or how they differed from you and I.  Rather, she relates to them on a one to one basis.  In doing so, she defies the widely held belief that these people were automotons who willingly followed Jim Jones to their death.

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Julia Scheeres selects a variety of people and follows them over the years.  These were not people who wanted to do the zombie death march.  One of the characters is a young boy who rebelled and was punished severely for it.  Ms Scheeres details exactly how well Jones had mentally and psychologically set up this banishment.  He forced parents to take sides against their own kids.  If they opted not to do so, their off spring  faced even more severe cruellty.  While it's hard for peopl who live in a society where cell phones exist everywhere to understand just how isolated this community was, the book tries its best to explain.  Passports were confiscated.  There was a jungle around the compound that was filled with hazordous snakes.  They were miles from the American embassy and they did not trust anybody---including their own family members.  Jones had played occupants  against each other.  On top of that, they were broken by a lack of sleep and starvation.

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In "A Thousand Lives," Julia Scheeres names names of those families who "ratted" on others to Jim Jones.  There were members  who wanted to leave, yet when they tried to do so, their trust was betrayed.

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In some ways it is easier to perceive these people, like those at Waco, as deserving of their fate.  It makes the horror more palatable.  We do this all the time.  We do this when we watch the news and see starving children in foreign lands.  How many others  have you heard make the statement, "They don't really value life that much over there?"  Explain that to the mother grieving th loss of her child.  Anybody who reads this book will never again accept the mantra that they wanted to die.