Cult Following: My escape and return to the Children of God

An unusual book as written by Bexy Cameron who was brought up with her family in a Cult and who escaped it when 15. It is shockingly not a work of fiction.
I found it interesting how she describes the formation of the Cults from the 1960's revolutions of sexual revolution, civil rights, women's rights, those wanting Peace not War. That mainly young people wanting a change to a calmer life were attracted by the cults, offering a peaceful, loving life with the companionship of only those wanting the same peaceful world.
Tragically a lot of the Cults were dominated by strong personalities who managed to lead the members in a direction to obtain their own needs and wants. Though the parents originally joined fighting for freedom and peace their children were forced to live a life of slavery with no rights.

Bexy’s parents were signed-up members of the Children of God, a notorious cult which attracted its fair share of both media and police attention in its hayday. Bexy was one of eleven siblings and she grew up in the cult, only leaving when she was 15. A decade later and she still has unresolved issues surrounding her childhood. She sets off on a road trip to visit other cults, and immerse herself in them. This venture has the dual aim of trying to find some personal closure as well as making a documentary about children growing up in these environments.

This is a fascinating insight into everyday life inside a cult. Despite some orientation problems at the start of the book I have to say that the more I read, the more compelling I found it.

However, I found both the writing style and the structure somewhat chaotic. This made it both difficult and confusing to read at times. In fact, at the start of the book it was so muddled that I nearly gave up.
The thing that I found most baffling was the sexual child abuse allegations which were targeted at both the Children of God and most (if not all) of the other cults which she visited. Bexy herself seemed in no doubt that these were true, and made them the main focal point of her later investigations yet, as far as I could tell, despite 15 years living in the “family” of the Children of God, she neither experienced nor witnessed anything of the sort.
I did feel that the book lost its way a little by trying to be both a memoir of Bexy’s early years, chronicling her life as a child growing up in a cult, whilst also trying to research other cults that were in existence when she was an adult. Both would have been quite interesting in themselves but, for me, the combination didn’t quite work.
The fourth star was a little reluctant – I think I would really rate it 3.5.

I would recommend this book to anyone who has an interest in cults. For a wider audience I am not sure how interesting it will be. But I should say that the online reviews are generally much more positive than mine.

"Cult Following" is a memoir written by Bexy Cameron. It tells of her life from birth until she managed to excape the cult into which she was born. Her experiences and those of the others who passed through her life were of starvation, deprivation, virtual slavery and fear. She describes the hopelessness of expecting anything else. After escaping from this cult, she goes forward with getting some education and finding a good friend who along with her decide to make a documentary movie to expose cultism.
She weaves the telling of her story with that of the various type of cults that abound. She describes the ways in which each is different from another and the ways in which they are the same.
It is interesting to read this and compare what she describes with the political events of the day. The extreme pitting of us against them; the feeding of lies or twisted misinformation; the concept of the supreme leader balanced with the insignificance of the followers.
This a bit disturbing to read knowing that it is a true story, one that continues, but a powerful thought provoking piece of what to do now that we know what is happening.