Meh.

This book wasn't <i>bad</i> but it wasn't <i>good</i> either. It could have been way better but the chapters were so short and the author shares her experience in these very broad and generalized ways. I wanted more details and richer descriptions of everything she went through. Sure, it's sad that she ever experienced this in her life especially during what should have been such a young and fun time but she never went deep enough into the details to truly help me connect. My reactions were more "well, that sucks" than "Omgosh, you poor thing! How traumatic. I can't believe she had to go through that." It could have been an incredible tale and instead it's another story I'll forget about in a month or two.

Fairly typical memoir from an individual who left a cult and had to learn to survive in the world after leaving.

This book is an unfortunate look into how people can be manipulated and used by others in their most downtrodden times. Mental health is so important and when someone steps in to a helping role then abuses that position everyone is affected. This is why it is so important that access to health professionals should be a priority, while those professionals are also watched over so situations such as this do not happen. It doesn't matter how many degrees you have, if you are in a vulnerable place and someone exploits that you are a victim of that person's villainy. It says much more about the perpetrator than it does about their victim. When someone repeatedly tells you that you are useless, it becomes difficult to disagree.

Elizabeth is tough, more so than she realizes because she got out. She had been trapped in this cult from such a young age that it hurts how much time was squandered when she should have been doing great things. George is a despicable human being and reading about how he treated these people. how he exploited them made me sick.

Thank you for sharing your story, thank you for telling other they are not alone and there is always hope.

I requested this book because I'm fascinated by cults and the cover copy sounded really intriguing. Unfortunately, I kept waiting for the story to begin and never felt emotionally invested. It seemed that it needed to be shaped by an editor.

(I will not be posting a review online, as I do not publicly post negative reviews.)

When we see a cult on the news, it's usually because they've done something awful on a compound somewhere, or in the jungles of Guyana. This memoir shows the scariness and mesmerizing power of a cult close to home, one that forms in the heart of a major metropolis, in one of the city's poshest neighborhoods, and for decades ensnared women and a few men into a cycle of brainwashing, dependence and abuse.

In 1977, Elizabeth Burchard's mother initiated their involvement in the cult run by the biofeedback technician practicing in her psychologist's office on Manhattan's Upper East Side. He was charismatic and effective in winning their trust and appreciation, and soon they'd left the therapist's practice and allowed the man, called George here, to run semiweekly meetings from Elizabeth's mother's apartment.

Elizabeth tells her story of living under George's exacting control. As mind-boggling as her participation seems, having graduated from prestigious Swarthmore College and coming as she does from a wealthy background (she inherited a small fortune upon her father's passing and her mother was a highly educated professional), Elizabeth shows some of the reasons and thinking that led her to fall under George's control and participate in horribly abusive group therapy sessions, which included creepy, awful sex abuse and extensive verbal and mental abuse.

He believes he's a Messiah and tries to resurrect his family's dog when it passes away. For years, he tries to resurrect a dead dog. He espouses a theory of "Energy" that he generates by head shaking and transmits to his followers, so they depend on him for this strength and power to accomplish things in their own lives. These personal lives consist mainly of working whatever day jobs they have in order to turn over checks, sometimes entire paychecks, of massive amounts of money to him for allowing him to preach insanity at and rape them.

He eventually taps into politics in an attempt to spread his beliefs and recruit followers, with Elizabeth and her fellow members campaigning first for Ross Perot and later for local government in New Jersey.

Elizabeth details her vulnerability that made her open and susceptible to this kind of mind control and indoctrination. Her mother was always aloof and sometimes cruel, her father died when she was young, and despite her strong academic abilities, she seemed lost and definitely was always searching for the love that she never got from her family. She makes it clear that despite his repulsive behavior, he was so narcissistic and authoritatively commanding that attention from him went a long way. He explains that he never gives gifts because "I am the gift." So we see a little of how those who were vulnerable were brainwashed into thinking he was something special and they were lucky to be close to him.

She also writes that he "loved to paint the bullseye around the arrow," ascribing his efforts to whatever outcome he's dealt and berating his believers for their lack of dedication or effort if there's failure. That way he's never wrong in their eyes.

Her escape was facilitated with the help of a new friend, Judith Carlone, who later in the book contributes a few of her own chapters explaining what she saw and perceived as an outsider, both of the situation and of Elizabeth's odd behavior.

When I visited Burchard's official website about the book, I saw that it's required reading at New York City's John Jay College of Criminal Justice, which I think is fantastic. Like a review noted for The Hot One, author Carolyn Murnick inadvertently supplied excellent telltale traits of a stalker and predator in her description of her friend's murderer, and this does the same for understanding cult initiation, abuse, and survivor psychology. There are clear examples of the kind of psychological manipulation used, sometimes scary in its simplicity, and the way language is twisted to the manipulator's benefit.

And as Burchard writes, "Although most people will never experience ensnarement in a bona fide cult, the interpersonal interactions we all share are subject to the potential abuses of deception, power, and control." So it's useful.

I didn't love the style - it's clear Burchard is intelligent and a decent writer, but I kept reading because the story was so bizarre and intriguing (and I have a weird fascination with cult stories) but the writing style didn't completely grab me. It's somewhat rambling and the narrative focuses heavily on financial details and business transactions which could've been consolidated and explained and still made an impact. I also didn't like some passages that went a little heavy on the Christianity which it seemed came after, or that the co-author puts forward.

But it's an interesting, quickly readable look at one woman's experience and escape from a controlling sect with some helpful markers for recognizing manipulative tendencies and cult psychology.