Seductive Poison

Seductive Poison, by Deborah Layton, 336 pages.

            This chilling and disturbing biography takes you on the journey of a women’s life from a rebellious teenager to a young women who barely escapes from The Peoples Temple, Jonestown. The biography starts with the author’s life as a teenager growing up in the bay area. She doesn’t follow the rules and tells of her many drug trips and problems with substance abuse as a teen. Her parents sent her away to try to get her clean and it worked for a few months, until she returned home. She started to get into trouble and decided she had to move to England with her aunt and uncle to get away from her drug problems. She spent time over there, but came back to California. This is when she and her Mother met Jim Jones, a priest who started a so-called “church” known as The People’s Temple. He persuaded them both into joining the church. This is when the book starts to become sickening. After Jim Jones would get these people to join he would beat them, rape the women, strip members in front of the congregation, over worked them till they were on the brink of collapsing, and sleep deprive them. The reason he could do this was because he prayed on vulnerable people who were down on their luck looking anywhere for a sign of hope, and he told them if they were to join him they would become apart of a great “utopia” where no one would persecute them ever again. He eventually moved the church to Guyana where things became worse and worse for the members of Jonestown.

             I personally enjoyed reading this book. Mainly because I like to read depressing gloomy books, but also because it is a story of one person who takes down an evil man. If you enjoy reading books where the little guy wins in the end you will love this book. The book itself is very well written and as the reader reads he/she will be able to tell the author poured their heart and soul into writing their account of what happened while at Jonestown. There are two major themes in this book and they are to never give up hope, and the bigger of the two themes is always make sure the person you trust has good intentions for you.