Reviews tagging 'Rape'

Under the Banner of Heaven: A Story of Violent Faith by Jon Krakauer

92 reviews

andmingmingtoo's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional informative reflective slow-paced

4.75

This book sets itself apart from most other "true crime" by going beyond the who+what+where+when to ask why-- instead of just focusing on one tragedy, this book asks how the setting and history surrounding what happened led to it occurring.
(Also bonus points to this book for making me hyperfixate on mormonism. It's so hard to explain to my friends that I'm having a mormon phase but not in a religious way, it's in a learning about neat history way)

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder, Physical abuse, Mental illness, Injury/Injury detail, Blood, Violence, Religious bigotry, Misogyny, Incest, Sexual violence, Emotional abuse, Domestic abuse, Death, Sexual assault, Grief, Adult/minor relationship, Sexism, and Rape

Moderate: Confinement, Trafficking, Kidnapping, Suicide, War, Suicidal thoughts, and Racism

Minor: Deportation, Homophobia, Cursing, and Alcohol

The main case in this book involves

the murder of a woman and her baby

. There's also a lot of discussion around religious fundamentalism, which includes

religiously-motivated murders and religiously-sanctioned child brides

lmsokol18's review against another edition

challenging dark informative fast-paced

5.0

Fascinating book that tells the story of the Lafferty murders and Mormon fundamentalism alongside the history of the Mormon religion. This book is enraging and devastating. 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Incest, Sexual assault, Child death, Murder, Physical abuse, Rape, Racism, Religious bigotry, Sexual violence, Blood, and Child abuse

gwynian's review against another edition

dark emotional informative sad tense medium-paced

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Blood, Kidnapping, Murder, Slavery, Toxic relationship, Toxic friendship, and Adult/minor relationship

Moderate: Cursing, Sexual violence, Stalking, Incest, Pedophilia, Body horror, Sexual assault, War, Infidelity, Racism, Rape, and Suicide attempt

Minor: Alcohol and Miscarriage

knachknachjoke's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional informative sad medium-paced

4.5

A haunting, thorough exploration of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, its history, and the dark implications of what actually investigating that history leads one to believe.

I would have considered myself somewhat knowledgeable on LDS church history before this read, but Krakhauer blew pretty much everything out of the water with how thorough his storytelling was. He discloses at the end his own perspective—that he hadn't intended for this to be anything other than an amicable exploration of Mormon history inspired by an admiration for his childhood friends' faiths—and the resonance I felt to his perspective was really startling.

I think my biggest takeaway from reading this, and I believe Krakhauer's from writing it, is just how frightening the two roads you can take after studying Mormonism's history are: either you discern it is one man's quest for sex and power, or you conclude that everything—polygamy, blood atonement, white supremacy, child abuse—is all true and all imperative to a right way of life.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Rape, Domestic abuse, Misogyny, Child death, Gore, Incest, Colonisation, Death, Death of parent, Infidelity, Hate crime, Pedophilia, Religious bigotry, Violence, Blood, Child abuse, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Emotional abuse, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Mental illness, Sexual assault, Suicide attempt, Suicide, Sexual violence, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Cursing, and Pregnancy

whitneybarr's review against another edition

challenging dark informative reflective sad medium-paced

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death and Murder

Minor: Rape, Sexual violence, and Child abuse

catslippers's review against another edition

adventurous dark informative medium-paced

3.75

Good pacing and prose for a fascinating topic. Krakauer editorialized a little too much for my taste, both in favor of and against Mormonism and the various other faiths depicted in this book.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder, Pedophilia, and Rape

marypetrushko's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional slow-paced

2.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Murder and Rape

mellowhello's review against another edition

dark informative medium-paced

4.0

This book is a little hard to follow at times (at least for me because my working memory isn’t so good) with all of the intermarriage and polygamy and jumping back and forth in time, but it is a fascinating dive into the history of Mormonism and its consistent fracturing into schisms. Although the book is largely focused on Mormon fundamentalists rather than mainstream Mormons, it provides an in-depth background on the founding of the faith and the factors that led to Utah being Mormon central. Would highly recommend to anyone who wants to learn more about it, with a big CW for some graphic violence, pedophilia and SA. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder

Moderate: Pedophilia, Sexual assault, and Rape

cinnaminskies's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional informative mysterious sad slow-paced

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Pedophilia, Religious bigotry, Trafficking, Violence, Murder, Adult/minor relationship, and Misogyny

Moderate: Rape, Hate crime, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Infidelity, Gun violence, Sexual violence, and Mental illness

tiredenglishteacher's review against another edition

dark informative medium-paced

3.75

Very informative exploration of one specific tragedy and how the history of the Mormon church fed into it. It was published in 2003 so there are some weird descriptions of women (nimbus of blond hair???) and a focus on certain individuals weight. Though it focuses on Mormon fundamentalism, I do think there is a lack of differentiation between the mainstream church and fundamentalists that leads to conflation that I don’t imagine is entirely accurate. Graphic description of the crime wasn’t needed for me to understand the atrocity. Also, audiobook weirdly repeated at times (2-3 sentences read twice back to back). 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence and Murder

Moderate: Rape, Incest, and Sexual violence