| Under the Banner of Heaven: A Story of Violent Faith | 
 enlarge | Author: Jon Krakauer
Publisher: Anchor
Category: Book
List Price: $14.95
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Avg. Customer Rating:   (729 reviews)
Sales Rank: 1245
Languages: English (Original Language), English (Unknown), English (Published)
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 432
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.4
Dimensions (in): 7.8 x 4.9 x 0.6
ISBN: 1400032806
Dewey Decimal Number: 289.33
EAN: 9781400032808
ASIN: 1400032806
Publication Date: June 8, 2004
Release Date: June 8, 2004
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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Product Description
Jon Krakauer?s literary reputation rests on insightful chronicles of lives conducted at the outer limits. He now shifts his focus from extremes of physical adventure to extremes of religious belief within our own borders, taking readers inside isolated American communities where some 40,000 Mormon Fundamentalists still practice polygamy. Defying both civil authorities and the Mormon establishment in Salt Lake City, the renegade leaders of these Taliban-like theocracies are zealots who answer only to God.
At the core of Krakauer?s book are brothers Ron and Dan Lafferty, who insist they received a commandment from God to kill a blameless woman and her baby girl. Beginning with a meticulously researched account of this appalling double murder, Krakauer constructs a multi-layered, bone-chilling narrative of messianic delusion, polygamy, savage violence, and unyielding faith. Along the way he uncovers a shadowy offshoot of America?s fastest growing religion, and raises provocative questions about the nature of religious belief.
Amazon.com Review
In 1984, Ron and Dan Lafferty murdered the wife and infant daughter of their younger brother Allen. The crimes were noteworthy not merely for their brutality but for the brothers' claim that they were acting on direct orders from God. In Under the Banner of Heaven, Jon Krakauer tells the story of the killers and their crime but also explores the shadowy world of Mormon fundamentalism from which the two emerged. The Mormon Church was founded, in part, on the idea that true believers could speak directly with God. But while the mainstream church attempted to be more palatable to the general public by rejecting the controversial tenet of polygamy, fundamentalist splinter groups saw this as apostasy and took to the hills to live what they believed to be a righteous life. When their beliefs are challenged or their patriarchal, cult-like order defied, these still-active groups, according to Krakauer, are capable of fighting back with tremendous violence. While Krakauer's research into the history of the church is admirably extensive, the real power of the book comes from present-day information, notably jailhouse interviews with Dan Lafferty. Far from being the brooding maniac one might expect, Lafferty is chillingly coherent, still insisting that his motive was merely to obey God's command. Krakauer's accounts of the actual murders are graphic and disturbing, but such detail makes the brothers' claim of divine instruction all the more horrifying. In an age where Westerners have trouble comprehending what drives Islamic fundamentalists to kill, Jon Krakauer advises us to look within America's own borders. --John Moe
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| Customer Reviews: Read 724 more reviews...
 Exeeded my expectations December 1, 2008
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
Before I read this book I had a number of friends tell me about it. Some loved it, some hated it, but they all agreed that it was a very negative portrayal of Mormons as a people and a religion.
Even with that knowledge going in I was very disappointed in this book.
After reading it I did a little research and found that almost all of Krakauer's cited sources are either ex-Mormons or members of polygamist sects. In other words: Not Mormons. How do you tell a people's history using only ex-members and fanatical splinter groups?
Would I go to a Ford dealer to get an objective opinion on buying a Toyota truck?
Would I get a fair depiction of Catholic history from a Protestant minister?
Not likely.
If you removed all the inaccuracies from this book you might have an interesting pamphlet about two brothers who commit a horrible, tragic murder.
The more I read the more I was led to one of two conclusions...
Either Krakauer's research was incredibly shoddy and one sided, Or he has revised and twisted information to support his own thin thesis as stated in the preface: "Any attempt to answer such questions [here he refers to why these two brothers would commit such a crime without remorse] must plumb those murky sectors of the heart and head that prompt most of us to believe in God-and compel an impassioned few, predictably, to carry that irrational belief to it's logical end."
So according to John, any belief in God is irrational and the logical conclusion of such a belief will lead to murder... ? Really guy?
The most truly objective history of Joseph Smith and the Mormons that I have read is Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling. If you want a more accurate portrayal of that church's history or it's founder, read that book. This one is yellow journalism at best.
Compelling November 8, 2008
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
While not as enjoyable as Krakauer's other works, UTBOH is a compelling read. Insightful, giving the outsider a view of the FLDS church that is seldom seen and even less understood. Some of the passages are disturbing and violent. The book sometimes has a feel of anti-religious propaganda, but give credit to Krakauer for being someone who attempts to deliver the facts as best he can. I am sure this was a very difficult book to research due to the "closed" nature of the society he was investigating. Great read for those interested in the topic. The casual reader, however, will be lost in the confusing morass that is the FLDS church.
Excellent book, difficult subject matter November 7, 2008
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
I'm not a fan of crime literature and I wasn't excited about reading this book. I'd devoured everything else of Krakauer's since "Into Thin Air" and his writing does not disappoint here, even when the going gets thick and rough and you almost need a program to figure out which Mormon is murdering whom on direct orders from God.
I'd never given Mormonism much thought, they seem like nice people, but I'd never heard of "fundamental" Mormonism, which was just about as creepy as anything I'd ever read about any other group or religion or cult. The idea of "celestial marriage" seems like a loony idea dreamt up by a horny old goat, it's laughable, yet it exists.
It's a fascinating history overall, and it is a Jon Krakauer book, so it's worth reading, but it is work to read about a couple of lunatics who conveniently receive instruction from God to murder an "uppity wife" of one of their own flesh-and-blood brothers. Certainly religious mania is stretched to transparency when a God-ordered killing plainly serves one's own interests.
Absent is the sense of a doomed but inspired hero as in "Into Thin Air" and "Into The Wild" -- the perpetrators deserve no sympathy and some sections of the book detail such heinous crimes that I wanted to put it down and go bathe in live steam to try and erase what I'd read. It's not an easy read and I'm glad I'm done with it.
Fascinating history, however. Worth reading.
 Scary and enlightening October 28, 2008
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
this book is applicable to all religions. It asks the disturbing question -- why do people kill other people for the benefit of their religion? the book also contains interesting history about the american southwest --- learn about the other american tragedy that occured on sept 11, but about 150 years ago.
morbid and fascinating October 24, 2008
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
I love Jon Krakauer's mountaineering writing; this was different but no less fascinating. Highly recommended if you can stomach both the violence and the religious weirdness.
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