Introduction

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Excerpt

Chapter One

For as long as Sara could remember, she jolted awake every morning, startled to be alive. Whenever her father looked at her, she imagined him calculating the width of her neck and the degree of pressure he would have to exert in order to snap it. This preoccupation with her own demise had become a morbid distraction, preventing her from planning her life farther ahead than minute by minute. Yet somehow those minutes had stacked up over the past fifteen years, propelling her to this day.

Waiting by her father’s dilapidated truck, Sara shivered despite stagnant desert air that had choked the valley for months. Swallowing hard, she fixed her gaze on the temple with its starchy white bell tower etched across the burnt umber of the foothills. It stood in reverent splendor and jarring contrast to the chalky aluminum meeting hall where Prophet Silver would soon decide who she would marry.

Sara eyed movement behind the dirty mesh of the screen door leading into their home. Rachel emerged from the house with a bounce to her step. “Ready?”

Sara nodded, overwhelmed by Rachel’s beauty and excitement. If only she could borrow a little of both, then perhaps she wouldn’t feel so doomed.

Their father surged through the back door, followed by a swarm of women and children. He pecked the cheeks of the four women and ruffled the heads of the toddlers. Approaching the truck, he actually smiled. It was a big, toothy grin that split his cheeks in two like a cracked egg. He flung open the passenger door and they piled in.

“You girls need to pray,” he ordered, thrusting the truck in reverse and throwing an arm across the seat as he pivoted to look behind him. “Ready your hearts and minds to receive Prophet Silver’s words with humility.”

Sara closed her eyes to pray, but she was disturbed by her father’s presence. He smelled like skewered beef and heavy grease, the stench originating from the goop he applied to his hair every morning. Despite the gel, the hair behind his ears flipped outward, reminding Sara of the headgear on a ram.

The car shot forward on the gravel road.

Sara’s stomach pitched. This was it. She cast a glance towards her sister who had immediately bowed her head and closed her eyes. Sara did the same, but not a single prayer came into her mind. It was rumored that the prophet could peer into a soul and pluck out the one thing a sinner was most intent on hiding. That alone should jump start the prayers, but it didn’t. Sara pressed her leg against Rachel’s and was comforted by the reassuring pressure back. Maybe she wasn’t praying either.

Planters filled with an assortment of spiky cacti, some as big as bathtubs, marked the entrance to the meeting hall. Thin, gun-slit shaped windows straddled the doorway of the metal building.

Sara followed Rachel and her father on wobbly legs. The foyer was deserted and their steps echoed in the empty building as they made their way to the prophet’s office.

The prophet was an elderly man, yet he exuded a youthful energy and an intensity that seized Sara in the gut. Taller than her father’s six feet, he loomed large with his lumpy-nose and square-jaw. Hard, gray eyes were crosshatched with seventy year’s worth of wrinkles. She had never been this close to him. It felt both humbling and frightening. Sara wanted to bolt for the door.

“Good to see you again, Brother Abraham,” Silver said, briskly shaking their father’s hand.

“We’re honored to be here.”

Silver turned towards them. “It’s not every day my office is graced with such lovely young ladies.” Sara flushed at the moist palms she presented. His eyes barely brushed hers before moving to Rachel. Wrapping two massive hands around hers, he held them while soaking up her beauty. “You must be Rachel.”

“Yes, sir.” Rachel kept her head down. Sara watched in horror as the prophet wrenched her chin up with his forefinger forcing her to maintain eye contact. He was the closest person to God that Sara had ever met, and yet all she wanted to do was shield Rachel from his penetrating gaze.

“You will look at me when I address you.”

Sara held her breath. She knew what an effort it was for Rachel to maintain eye contact with any adult, much less the Chosen One.

“Yes, sir,” Rachel whispered. She cleared her throat, and spoke louder. “I’m sorry, sir.”

“Good girls submit and receive blessings. Willful girls rebel and are cursed,” the Prophet said. “Do you choose total submission over rebellion, blessings over curses, the Celestial Kingdom over hell? Will you submit to the divine authority deeded to me by the heavenly Father in the Law of Placing?”

“I do,” said Rachel. He dropped his hands, turning to look at Sara.

She echoed Rachel’s proclamation, but the words rang hollow in her ears. She didn’t care who the Prophet had chosen for her. Her future consisted of minute-by-minute survival, and that was all.

Still, a bubble of curiosity percolated in her chest.

“Good,” the prophet smiled paternally. “Please take your seats.”

Several maroon colored leather chairs were arranged in front of an enormous mahogany desk. Walking behind it, Prophet Silver took a seat and shuffled papers. Sara’s upper lip went numb as it did when she was frightened.

The prophet cleared his throat, picked up a pair of glasses and settled them low on his nose. “Now to business.”

He looked down at a sheet of paper on his desk, then back up, catching Sara and her sister under his penetrating stare. “The two of you will become the mothers of our future priesthood holders. Perhaps your own sons will be called to a position of great authority on the Ruling Council. That is an enormous responsibility, and one that I do not take lightly when placing girls in a blessed union. Normally, my role is straightforward. As a girl comes of age, a member of the community will come to me with a testimony asking for the hand of that girl. I then pray for guidance and will receive an answer from the Almighty.”

Sara sensed her father’s movement as he nodded in agreement with the prophet’s words.

Prophet Silver continued, “Sometimes, the Lord speaks to me immediately, and the couple becomes sealed for all eternity within weeks of the initial testimony of marriage. Other times, the Lord has different plans that may take months or even years before divine inspiration is received.”

Sara suppressed a nervous smile. She thought of a few of those girls whom no man had ever received a testimony to marry. There was Henny Reynolds, a woman well into her twenties, who had been born with a severe limb deformity that caused her arms to resemble two tiny chicken feet. Julia Walker, a friend of her mothers, had scaly skin that rose from the collar of her dress and wrapped around her neck like a reptilian choker. Several other girls came to mind, all suffering from some affliction or another and all of whom remained single.

Prophet Silver leaned back in his chair and plucked the glasses off his nose. Looking right at Rachel, he said, “You’re approaching your sixteenth year and still have not been placed. Sara is several months younger than you, but she must wait until you make your endowment before she too can be married.” The prophet stroked his chin. “However, a situation has developed that will further delay your endowment.”

Sara darted a quick look at Rachel whose bottom lip had began to tremble. She wanted to reach out and grasp Rachel’s hand to steady her.

“We’ve had sixteen testimonies from various members of the community.” The prophet leaned back.

Sara thought she might be sick. She pressed her index finger against her upper lip, testing its obedience.

“You mean to tell me,” Father said, “that sixteen men have received testimony for Rachel?” view abbreviated excerpt only...

Discussion Questions

From the publisher:

1. In the book, Rachel’s physical beauty was detrimental to her safety. Can you think of other situations where physical attractiveness is not necessarily desirable?
2. Can you think of a scenario where a woman may want to live in a household with more than one wife?
3. Explain the significance of the fact that the two people, Irvin and Ernadine, who cared most about Sara and Rachel, were part of the minority group most reviled by the FLDS.
4. Why do you think Sara was able to reach her own independent conclusions about the fallacies inherent in the community’s dogma long before Rachel could see them?
5. If you were a sister wife, would you feel that your husband was cheating on you with the other wives?
6. Is jealously inevitable in a situation where several women share the same man? Is it part of human nature to be jealous?
7. Do you think that the nature of polygamy would create a caste system for wives?
8. The prophet exerted dominance over both the men and the women in Blood of the Lamb community, and he was the final arbiter for all important decisions, including who they may marry. Why would men, who have freedom to leave and more contact with the outside world, accept total domination by another man?
9. In order to separate herself from her blind faith, Rachel needed a cataclysmic event to challenge her entrenched belief system. What are other ways that someone loses his or her faith?
10. How does a belief system taught in childhood affect a person into adulthood? Can a person ever truly let go of the faith of their childhood if it was deeply ingrained in them like it was for Rachel?
11. Rachel’s understanding of her world was through her faith, when she lost that, she began to lose her mind. How important do you think spirituality is to one’s emotional and psychological well-being?

Suggested by Members

by DonnaS (see profile) 07/15/10

Weblinks

»	Publisher's Book Info
»	Author Claire Avery's web site
»	Claire Avery's Facebook Page
»	Claire Avery's Twitter Account
»	Claire Avery Interview on You Tube

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Recommended to book clubs by 3 of 3 members.

by DonnaS (see profile) 07/15/10

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