This was a great collection of cult sources, providing background and a window into the thinking of these mass movements. The first half of the book was the most informative to me, as I knew little of those groups or movements. The second half, while I knew about them, I would say was more enlightening. The scariest part of reading through all of this collection, is, at the end, when I thought: many of these groups don't seem as so far out there as I thought they were. Coerced? Yes. Manipulated? Yes. But unfortunately that is routine in deviant behavior.
This book is an insightful collection into one of the dark sides of human history. Readers will be able to put the different movements into a larger historical context, and view, however disturbing it might be, the humanness of these groups.