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Without a Prayer: The Death of Lucas Leonard and How One Church Became a Cult
The horrifying true story of a killing inside the secluded Word of Life Christian Church, a parish-turned-cult in upstate New York.
Teenager Lucas Leonard made shocking admissions in front of the altar―he'd practiced witchcraft, conspired to murder his parents, and committed unspeakable crimes. The confessions earned him a brutal beating by a gang of angry church members, including his parents and sister. Lucas was brought to the hospital dead, awakening the sleepy community of Chadwicks, New York, to the horror that had been lurking next door.
Nine members of Lucas' church would eventually find themselves facing murder-related charges. But how did they get to that point? And what made Lucas confess? The full story has never been told―until now.
Emmy-nominated journalist Susan Ashline delves deep into the Leonard family history, the darkness within the Word of Life Christian Church, and what led Lucas, his family, and his community to that fateful night.
Teenager Lucas Leonard made shocking admissions in front of the altar―he'd practiced witchcraft, conspired to murder his parents, and committed unspeakable crimes. The confessions earned him a brutal beating by a gang of angry church members, including his parents and sister. Lucas was brought to the hospital dead, awakening the sleepy community of Chadwicks, New York, to the horror that had been lurking next door.
Nine members of Lucas' church would eventually find themselves facing murder-related charges. But how did they get to that point? And what made Lucas confess? The full story has never been told―until now.
Emmy-nominated journalist Susan Ashline delves deep into the Leonard family history, the darkness within the Word of Life Christian Church, and what led Lucas, his family, and his community to that fateful night.
400 pages, Hardcover
First published August 6, 2019
62 people are currently reading
1851 people want to read
About the author
Susan Ashline
3 books21 followersSusan Ashline is the author of A Jacket Off the Gorge, the nationally acclaimed true crime book Without A Prayer, and the forthcoming Ungrateful Bastard. She is featured in two Hulu docuseries: “How I Escaped My Cult” and “Cult Justice.” The episodes are based on her book Without A Prayer. Susan’s journalism career spans more than twenty-five years and includes news reporting for most of the major television networks. She has covered everything from breaking news to politics. Her long-time role as a court correspondent sparked a deep interest in law and the criminal justice system. Susan has worked as a radio reporter, talk show host, television news anchor, magazine editor, website manager, and staff newspaper columnist for publishing juggernaut, Gannett. Her work has received major awards, including an Emmy nomination for a public broadcasting societal concerns program, a first place Associated Press award for general excellence in individual reporting, and a Gold Medal Award for Democrat and Chronicle online excellence. She graduated from Gloversville High School (NY), earned a BA in Mass Communication from the University of Massachusetts, and studied at the University of New Mexico and State University of New York.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 109 reviews
February 8, 2022
This is without a single doubt, the most disturbing and traumatizing book involving a religion turned cult that I have ever read. Word of warning, this book is not for the faint of heart, it is brutal and graphic and there are A LOT of potential triggers throughout. It feels weird giving such a book 5 stars because I wouldn’t really say I enjoyed it in the typical sense you normally enjoy a book. My skin was crawling the whole way through and I often had to pause to collect myself while reading it because I was just so disturbed and horrified by what I was reading. The depravity that humans can inflict on each other is truly terrifying, to think that that can happen just chills me to the bone. This book managed to evoke more emotion than me than any book has in a long time and to actually make me feel physically ill, I have never been more horrified by anything I’ve read.
September 27, 2019
Susan Ashline's WITHOUT A PRAYER: THE DEATH OF LUCAS LEONARD AND HOW ONE CHURCH BECAME A CULT is a tough read, for more than one reason.
Detailing the history of the Leonard family and their association with the Word of Life Christian Church, and the events that lead up to the torture and murder of young Lucas Leonard, and the near-death of his brother, Chris, author Ashline recounts the history with an almost inevitable sense of tragedy.
The Word of Life Christian Church, founded and run by Jerry Irwin and his family, did not become a cult, in my opinion, but started out as one, and merely became worse as time went by. The Irwin family ran a church based on bullying and shaming their handful of members into donating, or "tithing" phenomenal sums of money, leaving already impoverished families practically destitute. The Irwins were based out of a massive former public school, which they turned into an armed camp, complete with 24-7 sermons blasting from loudspeakers in every room, and locked gates and doors.
I often wonder how people get sucked into cults, and while Ashline does an very thorough job of detailing almost every aspect of life in the Leonard and Irwin families, there aren't many answers to be found here. "Pastor" Jerry Irwin was an anti-social nut, a trait that he passed on to his daughter Tiffanie, a self-professed prophet. Bruce and Debi Irwin were just weak-mined people who preferred to live like sheep and have their lives dictated to them by an authority figure. The crushing isolation that church members were forced to endure, and the constant threats and propositions for more money by the Irwins created a pressure-cooker environment of guilt, shame, and loneliness that ultimately lead to a fatal confrontation after a marathon Sunday worship session, ending with a 12+ hour torture session that found Luke beaten mercilessly by members of the church, and members of his own family, including his parents and sister.
The first half of the book dragged a bit...there is only so much you can read about how strange the Irwins were, or how they beat down and controlled the parishioners before it basically becomes a catalog of misery. Once Ashline gets to the fatal last day of Lucas Leonard, the book kicks into high gear, and becomes a riveting police procedural. This is where I start to have a major problem with how Ashline handles the chapter detailing Lucas' death, though.
The lengthy chapter reads like a novel, complete with dialogue, detailed descriptions of who did what, who said what, where they were standing or sitting, when heads were turned, when people left and entered the room.....since the Irwins meticulously filmed and recorded most of what went on in their church, I assumed that this was all taken verbatim from a video/audio record of the murder...but we later learn that the memory card that held that evidence was burned by Tiffanie, so everything that Ashline describes is cobbled together from interviews and police records. I'm fine with that, but she takes a little too much dramatic license, and presents all of this as complete fact. I'm not good with her imagining dialogue and speeches and attributing it to the people in the room, especially since most of them either didn't cooperate with authorities, or else said that they were in such a state at the time that remembering what went on was a virtual impossibility. This was not a deal-breaker, but it bothered me a lot. Your mileage may vary.
As I said, this was a tough book to read. As a parent, I can scarcely imagine laying a hand on my children, let alone beating one to death, and coming close to doing that to another. Ashline and several members of the police force and prosecution team seem very sympathetic to the Leonards, Bruce in particular, but I couldn't summon up my sympathy for these weak-minded people who forced their children to live in filth while they blindly followed this demented "Holy" family. Overall, Ashline has delivered a gripping book, which I heartily recommend, with a few caveats.
The publisher provided a review copy.
Detailing the history of the Leonard family and their association with the Word of Life Christian Church, and the events that lead up to the torture and murder of young Lucas Leonard, and the near-death of his brother, Chris, author Ashline recounts the history with an almost inevitable sense of tragedy.
The Word of Life Christian Church, founded and run by Jerry Irwin and his family, did not become a cult, in my opinion, but started out as one, and merely became worse as time went by. The Irwin family ran a church based on bullying and shaming their handful of members into donating, or "tithing" phenomenal sums of money, leaving already impoverished families practically destitute. The Irwins were based out of a massive former public school, which they turned into an armed camp, complete with 24-7 sermons blasting from loudspeakers in every room, and locked gates and doors.
I often wonder how people get sucked into cults, and while Ashline does an very thorough job of detailing almost every aspect of life in the Leonard and Irwin families, there aren't many answers to be found here. "Pastor" Jerry Irwin was an anti-social nut, a trait that he passed on to his daughter Tiffanie, a self-professed prophet. Bruce and Debi Irwin were just weak-mined people who preferred to live like sheep and have their lives dictated to them by an authority figure. The crushing isolation that church members were forced to endure, and the constant threats and propositions for more money by the Irwins created a pressure-cooker environment of guilt, shame, and loneliness that ultimately lead to a fatal confrontation after a marathon Sunday worship session, ending with a 12+ hour torture session that found Luke beaten mercilessly by members of the church, and members of his own family, including his parents and sister.
The first half of the book dragged a bit...there is only so much you can read about how strange the Irwins were, or how they beat down and controlled the parishioners before it basically becomes a catalog of misery. Once Ashline gets to the fatal last day of Lucas Leonard, the book kicks into high gear, and becomes a riveting police procedural. This is where I start to have a major problem with how Ashline handles the chapter detailing Lucas' death, though.
The lengthy chapter reads like a novel, complete with dialogue, detailed descriptions of who did what, who said what, where they were standing or sitting, when heads were turned, when people left and entered the room.....since the Irwins meticulously filmed and recorded most of what went on in their church, I assumed that this was all taken verbatim from a video/audio record of the murder...but we later learn that the memory card that held that evidence was burned by Tiffanie, so everything that Ashline describes is cobbled together from interviews and police records. I'm fine with that, but she takes a little too much dramatic license, and presents all of this as complete fact. I'm not good with her imagining dialogue and speeches and attributing it to the people in the room, especially since most of them either didn't cooperate with authorities, or else said that they were in such a state at the time that remembering what went on was a virtual impossibility. This was not a deal-breaker, but it bothered me a lot. Your mileage may vary.
As I said, this was a tough book to read. As a parent, I can scarcely imagine laying a hand on my children, let alone beating one to death, and coming close to doing that to another. Ashline and several members of the police force and prosecution team seem very sympathetic to the Leonards, Bruce in particular, but I couldn't summon up my sympathy for these weak-minded people who forced their children to live in filth while they blindly followed this demented "Holy" family. Overall, Ashline has delivered a gripping book, which I heartily recommend, with a few caveats.
The publisher provided a review copy.
September 6, 2019
This book was very compelling and well written, organized in sections about the histories of the various families and churches involved so it made it easy to really sink into the dynamics of this small group of people under the sway of not one but TWO cult leaders, father and daughter. I did think that the middle section got a little bogged down in recountings of truly bizarre sermons and lectures by the Pastor (there is extensive video and audio recordings of the church, so the author had access to a great deal of source material). The pace picked up again about halfway through when the crime in question occurred. Recommended for those with morbid curiosity about cults.
September 1, 2019
In October 2015, a vehicle arrived at an emergency room in central New York with a severely beaten young man inside. Lucas Leonard had died before he was brought to the hospital by family members and those in his church community. Hospital employees knew right away that something was off about the stories they were told, so they called the police. The facts that emerged were shocking and frightening: the fatal beating of Lucas occurred at the hands of his parents, sister and others in his church. In WITHOUT A PRAYER, journalist Susan Ashline tells the story of the Word of Life Christian Church in Chadwicks, New York, and how it grew increasingly controlling, dangerous and eventually violent.
The church, originally founded and led by Pastor Jerry Irwin, was a conservative Bible-based congregation. It opened its doors in a former school building, hopeful to fill all the seats in the large sanctuary. Bruce and Deborah Leonard, along with their three children from previous marriages and four together, were there just about from the start and were one of the most devoted families. The Leonard kids were mostly educated in the church’s school, as the church was the center of their lives. Over the years, the Irwin family became more and more god-like in their power and authority, controlling the Leonards in a variety of ways.
After the frankly bizarre death of Jerry, his daughter Tiffanie became the Pastor of the church. With her ascension, the culture at Word of Life became even more extreme. Believed by her flock to be a prophet of God, Tiffanie’s sermons stretched out for hours, and she began publicly humiliating her congregants and pitting them against each other. She was supported by her mother and often flanked by her two brothers, who physically intimidated those in the church.
Ashline does a great job describing the slow, and then incredibly rapid, Word of Life transformation from a church to a cult. Because the Irwins documented everything they did, she was able to draw from hours and hours of videos, text messages, journals and more. These same resources helped the police and lawyers understand what led to Lucas’ fatal beating and the near-fatal beating of his younger brother, Christopher.
WITHOUT A PRAYER is terrifying stuff, and Ashline’s clear journalistic narrative style never gets in the way of the story she is telling. There are a lot of characters here and a great deal of action, not to mention the steadily increasing tension that is key to the events. Ashline has control of it all, resulting in a fascinating, heartbreaking and fraught page-turner. The moments in which the book slows down or becomes repetitive are few and far between. More exploration of the distinction between churches and cults would’ve been useful. Still, because Lucas is kept at the center of the book, it remains cogent and cohesive.
In the U.S., religion is both foundational to identity when it is one’s own and suspect when it belongs to someone from another tradition. The story of the Word of Life Christian Church is so compelling because it seems at once familiar enough and yet totally other. How can something as normal and even comforting as a faith community act so horrifically, with such hatred and violence? Ashline avoids easy judgments in favor of letting the story unfold and the evidence speak for itself.
Overall, WITHOUT A PRAYER is a powerful and absorbing contribution to the libraries of true crime, sociology and long-form journalism.
Reviewed by Sarah Rachel Egelman
The church, originally founded and led by Pastor Jerry Irwin, was a conservative Bible-based congregation. It opened its doors in a former school building, hopeful to fill all the seats in the large sanctuary. Bruce and Deborah Leonard, along with their three children from previous marriages and four together, were there just about from the start and were one of the most devoted families. The Leonard kids were mostly educated in the church’s school, as the church was the center of their lives. Over the years, the Irwin family became more and more god-like in their power and authority, controlling the Leonards in a variety of ways.
After the frankly bizarre death of Jerry, his daughter Tiffanie became the Pastor of the church. With her ascension, the culture at Word of Life became even more extreme. Believed by her flock to be a prophet of God, Tiffanie’s sermons stretched out for hours, and she began publicly humiliating her congregants and pitting them against each other. She was supported by her mother and often flanked by her two brothers, who physically intimidated those in the church.
Ashline does a great job describing the slow, and then incredibly rapid, Word of Life transformation from a church to a cult. Because the Irwins documented everything they did, she was able to draw from hours and hours of videos, text messages, journals and more. These same resources helped the police and lawyers understand what led to Lucas’ fatal beating and the near-fatal beating of his younger brother, Christopher.
WITHOUT A PRAYER is terrifying stuff, and Ashline’s clear journalistic narrative style never gets in the way of the story she is telling. There are a lot of characters here and a great deal of action, not to mention the steadily increasing tension that is key to the events. Ashline has control of it all, resulting in a fascinating, heartbreaking and fraught page-turner. The moments in which the book slows down or becomes repetitive are few and far between. More exploration of the distinction between churches and cults would’ve been useful. Still, because Lucas is kept at the center of the book, it remains cogent and cohesive.
In the U.S., religion is both foundational to identity when it is one’s own and suspect when it belongs to someone from another tradition. The story of the Word of Life Christian Church is so compelling because it seems at once familiar enough and yet totally other. How can something as normal and even comforting as a faith community act so horrifically, with such hatred and violence? Ashline avoids easy judgments in favor of letting the story unfold and the evidence speak for itself.
Overall, WITHOUT A PRAYER is a powerful and absorbing contribution to the libraries of true crime, sociology and long-form journalism.
Reviewed by Sarah Rachel Egelman
August 9, 2019
Without A Prayer by Susan Ashline deftly broadens the scope of the true crime genre, delving into the intricacies of how and why noble people can become criminals within the confines of a religious cult. Readers must maintain an open mind throughout the book, giving attention to detail, as the author presents information that may appear convoluted at times, allowing readers to draw their own conclusions. Readers will discover that going through the book a second time will afford even greater understanding, as many details will become incorporated to build the story.
Without A Prayer has already received excellent reviews, including prestigious starred reviews from Publishers Weekly and Library Journal. I offer this review with the disclaimer that I am neither a professional writer nor an avid reader. However, I am keenly invested as one whose story is presented in these pages. Lucas Leonard was my little brother.
I have read this book twice now, and I can say I have zero complaints. Susan Ashline immersed herself in the dramatic saga of the Word of Life Christian Church in Chadwicks, NY, enabling her to create an accurate, thorough account from its shadowy origins to its explosive demise. Truly, the author has accomplished an incredible task. From an overwhelming amount of information she compiled a comprehensive yet highly readable work. She wove a tangled mess of threads into a cohesive tapestry, where the whole picture is visible, while each thread remains crucial.
Susan’s use of early sermon quotes to open chapters in part one of the book provides vital elements to set the mood and tone. The significant portions of actual dialog throughout the book deliver a frightening taste of the reality that existed inside the walls of Word of Life. The reader is offered a bird’s eye view and a zoom lens at the same time with perspectives from neighbors, acquaintances, former members, and words of inner-circle members plus the Irwins themselves.
As Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. declared, “Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that,” Susan Ashline’s Without A Prayer illuminates the evil that was hidden at the Word of Life Church, exposing the destructive mind control that resulted in the death of my brother. The tragic events of October 11-12, 2015, are unearthed as private communications are flayed for the world to see. The questions and suspicions long surrounding this story are addressed through the author’s skillful and persistent investigations.
This heartbreaking tale garnered international attention and generated far more questions than answers. Without a Prayer provides many of those missing answers, while offering justice to the victims and closure to a distraught community near and far.
Without A Prayer has already received excellent reviews, including prestigious starred reviews from Publishers Weekly and Library Journal. I offer this review with the disclaimer that I am neither a professional writer nor an avid reader. However, I am keenly invested as one whose story is presented in these pages. Lucas Leonard was my little brother.
I have read this book twice now, and I can say I have zero complaints. Susan Ashline immersed herself in the dramatic saga of the Word of Life Christian Church in Chadwicks, NY, enabling her to create an accurate, thorough account from its shadowy origins to its explosive demise. Truly, the author has accomplished an incredible task. From an overwhelming amount of information she compiled a comprehensive yet highly readable work. She wove a tangled mess of threads into a cohesive tapestry, where the whole picture is visible, while each thread remains crucial.
Susan’s use of early sermon quotes to open chapters in part one of the book provides vital elements to set the mood and tone. The significant portions of actual dialog throughout the book deliver a frightening taste of the reality that existed inside the walls of Word of Life. The reader is offered a bird’s eye view and a zoom lens at the same time with perspectives from neighbors, acquaintances, former members, and words of inner-circle members plus the Irwins themselves.
As Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. declared, “Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that,” Susan Ashline’s Without A Prayer illuminates the evil that was hidden at the Word of Life Church, exposing the destructive mind control that resulted in the death of my brother. The tragic events of October 11-12, 2015, are unearthed as private communications are flayed for the world to see. The questions and suspicions long surrounding this story are addressed through the author’s skillful and persistent investigations.
This heartbreaking tale garnered international attention and generated far more questions than answers. Without a Prayer provides many of those missing answers, while offering justice to the victims and closure to a distraught community near and far.
April 16, 2024
3.5 ⭐️s! The end of the first half of the book begins to feel very repetitive and slow -- I almost DNF'd during the second quarter because how much it began to feel like it was dragging. About halfway through, you reach the point of the final "counseling session", which is what causes Lucas Leonard's death. The description of the crime itself is incredibly graphic and hard to get through. The recounting of the criminal investigations and courtroom proceedings is where this book really shined though. Overall, a pretty interesting read.
July 19, 2021
I got this book on Audible, and it was a wild ride. It is amazing to me how people get involved in things like this, and all the shenanagins that these religious leaders get up to. This is a must read, in my opinion, for anyone interested in cults in general.
February 26, 2020
This book was truly horrifying. I found myself hoping that everyone would turn their backs on self-proclaimed pastor Tiffany and her crazy mind control tactics. The Irwin family abused their constituents financially and psychologically and eventually physically with no thought for anyone’s feelings. They were making a very good income by Tiffanie saying God told her people needed to give money while the people giving the money were barely getting by. Having met all the members charged and later convicted of these crimes I can say the only one truly nuts was Tiffanie, and this book proves just that. She constantly tried to control everyone and everything around her by threats of the wrath of God. The girl didn’t have a godly bone in her whole body. Truth be told, she’s probably still controlling everything for the women she’s housed with in state prison. She should have been separated from the rest so maybe they would have a chance to get out of the Tiffanie cult.
August 10, 2025
super well written, incredibly hard to listen to. I've watched a couple of short-form docs about this cult and this was way more detailed and offered a lot that those didn't, and also went into incredibly intense detail about what the boys suffered.
July 13, 2022
I found it heartbreaking. I grew up in Utica where the trail was. I knew some of the people mention in the book. May Lucas rest in peace
September 14, 2020
Very thorough reporting of a tragic event. Clearly well researched account of the dangers of cults, if that sounds interesting to you then I recommend it!
June 17, 2022
Recommended by someone who knew one of the victims after this tragedy occurred, I persevered through a very uncomfortable and at times aggravating read. Ashline provides contextual history of this locally (and nationally) infamous family and how they came to be involved in the fatal beating of their teenaged boys based on interviews with people who knew them, and that was an interesting start to the book. Once they joined the Word of Life "Church" in the narrative, she relies on copious transcripts of and actual recordings of the indoctrination of the "church" members and the horrific antics of the cult leaders. This part was grueling, aggravating, and awful, and I almost quit reading several times but wanted to find out what happened that night and what the consequences were, and I was afraid I'd miss something important, but really, it was just repetitive verbal abuse and manipulation tactics that lasted for hours on end and it was almost as defeating for the reader to read it as it was to have had to listen to the beratement as a "church member." However, once the beating was over and law enforcement and first responders stepped in, I couldn't put it down, and that's why this gets 3 stars for me.
I do know about cults and their methodology. I learned about it in a full-semester class in college called "The Sociology of Cults," and for free-reading pleasure I read Helter Skelter: The True Story of the Manson Murders and a book about Jim Jones (and I'll throw in Educated on this topic, too, so I have strong background knowledge. If you are new to cults, maybe it's important to read the first half of this book, but I actually recommend skipping most of the first half of the book (after Ashline tells you that Sarah moved in to the Leonard's house---the end of the first part).
It would suffice to sum it up here:
Sarah was hysterical and verbally abusive and a total zealous nut-job who was on a constant witch hunt in the household, consecrating, exorcising demons, berating and emasculating all males in the home, and the rest of the Leonards who actually had legal ownership of the home had zero boundaries or spines because they were brainwashed and in a stupor of inaction the entire time. A trashy, coddled, petulant daughter of a Jim-Jones type cult leader grows up to take over the congregation and employs every tactic in the book to maintain control of the cult, to the utter detriment of her followers, and then one night..... Pick up the book from this point, here. Really, everything before that is tedious, horrendous recordings (transcribed) of abuse that causes the reader to suffer the monotony of listening to such a person spew garbage out of her mouth for hours on end...not pleasant! Go with my summary instead!
So continue with the night that was the culmination of the tragedy that had been brewing for 20 years, and enjoy the rest of the book.
It was beneficial to me, in a sad way, to see that this crap can and does happen right here in my own backyard, that our own, local people sit around and do nothing while animals, children, and even adults are systematically abused and denied the right to live, grow, and practically breathe. It's not like everyone was shocked that such a thing happened...everyone was kind of just waiting for it to get to that point while NO ONE intervened. As with the experience of reading Educated, you start to question our society's tenet that we have the right to religious freedom. Because a lot of abuse of children happens under this umbrella.
So it is a fascinating story but a difficult read (actually arduous, not just emotionally difficult).
I think I enjoyed the second half of the book so much more because there were intelligent, strong, take-charge, educated people saying understandable and logical things and getting the prosecution/treatment job done, which was a refreshing change after being mired in garbage and trash and lack of logic for so long in the first part. I'd recommend it to locals (with advice to skip over a third of it), but if you aren't local, some other books about cults would be more interesting, writing-wise.
I do know about cults and their methodology. I learned about it in a full-semester class in college called "The Sociology of Cults," and for free-reading pleasure I read Helter Skelter: The True Story of the Manson Murders and a book about Jim Jones (and I'll throw in Educated on this topic, too, so I have strong background knowledge. If you are new to cults, maybe it's important to read the first half of this book, but I actually recommend skipping most of the first half of the book (after Ashline tells you that Sarah moved in to the Leonard's house---the end of the first part).
It would suffice to sum it up here:
Sarah was hysterical and verbally abusive and a total zealous nut-job who was on a constant witch hunt in the household, consecrating, exorcising demons, berating and emasculating all males in the home, and the rest of the Leonards who actually had legal ownership of the home had zero boundaries or spines because they were brainwashed and in a stupor of inaction the entire time. A trashy, coddled, petulant daughter of a Jim-Jones type cult leader grows up to take over the congregation and employs every tactic in the book to maintain control of the cult, to the utter detriment of her followers, and then one night..... Pick up the book from this point, here. Really, everything before that is tedious, horrendous recordings (transcribed) of abuse that causes the reader to suffer the monotony of listening to such a person spew garbage out of her mouth for hours on end...not pleasant! Go with my summary instead!
So continue with the night that was the culmination of the tragedy that had been brewing for 20 years, and enjoy the rest of the book.
It was beneficial to me, in a sad way, to see that this crap can and does happen right here in my own backyard, that our own, local people sit around and do nothing while animals, children, and even adults are systematically abused and denied the right to live, grow, and practically breathe. It's not like everyone was shocked that such a thing happened...everyone was kind of just waiting for it to get to that point while NO ONE intervened. As with the experience of reading Educated, you start to question our society's tenet that we have the right to religious freedom. Because a lot of abuse of children happens under this umbrella.
So it is a fascinating story but a difficult read (actually arduous, not just emotionally difficult).
I think I enjoyed the second half of the book so much more because there were intelligent, strong, take-charge, educated people saying understandable and logical things and getting the prosecution/treatment job done, which was a refreshing change after being mired in garbage and trash and lack of logic for so long in the first part. I'd recommend it to locals (with advice to skip over a third of it), but if you aren't local, some other books about cults would be more interesting, writing-wise.
May 27, 2024
The things humans do to one another - even in her mugshot, Tiffanie Irwin looks unrepentant.
May 20, 2024
This book made me FURIOUS. All churches are cults. Very well written, though.
July 14, 2019
This is a true story that is very well written and grabbed my attention with the blurb and the book did not disappoint. This book is a powerful and heartbreaking example of what can happen when an evil man gains control of a congregation and they start to follow his teachings and laws rather than those of God. Sometimes this book is difficult to read, the content is horrific and the fact that it is truly makes it even more horrific. For people who are interested in cults and/or true crime this is a must read.
August 21, 2019
This book could have been titled, "No One Here is Sane." I picked this book up for my vacation to Maine, but I read the whole thing in the 48 hours before I left for Maine. I plan on re-reading it on vacation. It is an incredible story and incredible reporting. It is a very dark story, but readable even for the feint of heart. The author is from Gloversville, NY, near where I live. The story took place near Utica in upstate NY. Some of the darkest stories seem to emerge from upstate NY. The opening scene is great. It's Indian Summer 2015, and Halloween is approaching. The former school building in Chadwicks, NY is the talk of the neighborhood because it was sold several years earlier to a church group who seemed innocuous enough when they first purchased it. They initially made aesthetic improvements such as landscaping and in the first couple of years gave out cakes, breads, and doughnuts to the neighborhood. But as time passed they seemed to grow weirder. The "parishioners" weren't friendly nor did they interact with neighbors. The building's gate was locked after people arrived and again after they left. New people inquiring weren't welcome. People in black trench coats hid in the bushes. Men paced the roof, guarding the place. Despite people's dark suspicions, nothing could have prepared anyone for what would eventually happen there.
One note to readers is there is a lengthy cast of characters who are repeated throughout the book and you need to slow down a little to keep them straight, but they're not hard to learn although they can't be skimmed over. This book and story should be spread around as much as possible for it's a valuable lesson. It's a microcosm of America today, where there seems to be a lack of respect for our fellow citizens compared to the decades of the '50s, through '80s. Tiffanie Irwin certainly lacked respect even for her followers.
One note to readers is there is a lengthy cast of characters who are repeated throughout the book and you need to slow down a little to keep them straight, but they're not hard to learn although they can't be skimmed over. This book and story should be spread around as much as possible for it's a valuable lesson. It's a microcosm of America today, where there seems to be a lack of respect for our fellow citizens compared to the decades of the '50s, through '80s. Tiffanie Irwin certainly lacked respect even for her followers.
October 16, 2025
This book seems almost fictional. The actions of the people within this cult are so unbelievably absurd that you can't help but think this is all made up.
The author did a wonderful, thorough job when it came to the research of this crime.
I can't imagine the amount of time and motivation you have to keep up with completing a project like this. I could not stop reading this.
The topic of "sexual sin" is the main subject in Without a Prayer. There is a lot of controlling and play-by-play evidence there for the taking. That is how cult leaders get caught. For some reason, they have to record every single thing. To think that all but one of the people who were a part of this crime are out of prison right now is upsetting. If you enjoy learning and looking into the lives of people who are leaders and followers of cults, Susan Ashline is wonderful and is sharing everything the media left out surrounding this case. Ages 17+
The author did a wonderful, thorough job when it came to the research of this crime.
I can't imagine the amount of time and motivation you have to keep up with completing a project like this. I could not stop reading this.
The topic of "sexual sin" is the main subject in Without a Prayer. There is a lot of controlling and play-by-play evidence there for the taking. That is how cult leaders get caught. For some reason, they have to record every single thing. To think that all but one of the people who were a part of this crime are out of prison right now is upsetting. If you enjoy learning and looking into the lives of people who are leaders and followers of cults, Susan Ashline is wonderful and is sharing everything the media left out surrounding this case. Ages 17+
March 5, 2020
This book was an intense, emotional roller coaster.
I listened to the audio book version on my commute and several times had to switch to music to get a break from the reading.
The first half of the book is about the development of the church and a very in-depth dive into how the pastor(s) and their family brainwashed and brow-heated their parishioners into submission. It was hard to listen to at times, and I would venture to guess very triggering for anyone who experienced emotional abuse and manipulation.
I found myself often screaming insults at the pastor(s) while listening, very un-Christian and vulgar ones at that.
Still, I loved the book. It was intense. I had to soften it up with light reads throughout. I highly recommend, but make sure you have the emotional fortitude for it.
I listened to the audio book version on my commute and several times had to switch to music to get a break from the reading.
The first half of the book is about the development of the church and a very in-depth dive into how the pastor(s) and their family brainwashed and brow-heated their parishioners into submission. It was hard to listen to at times, and I would venture to guess very triggering for anyone who experienced emotional abuse and manipulation.
I found myself often screaming insults at the pastor(s) while listening, very un-Christian and vulgar ones at that.
Still, I loved the book. It was intense. I had to soften it up with light reads throughout. I highly recommend, but make sure you have the emotional fortitude for it.
October 9, 2024
3-1/2 stars, I think. I was somewhat familiar with this case already, but this book went into far more detail than I previously knew. In fact, it was so detailed, I had to skip about an hour or so (I was listening to the audiobook) where the crime was graphically described. And to be clear, this crime was horrific. The first half of this book was a great case study in how a church can morph into a dangerous cult without the parishioners even realizing what’s happening. The last paragraph, from the dad’s perspective after being deprogrammed, was by far the best part of the book. The rest of the perpetrators can rot.
August 21, 2024
3.75⭐ rounded up. There was a lot of info and back story given in this book, so you can tell it was well researched and time was taken to get through all the video documentation. I liked the beginning of how the main people came to be at Word of Life but the middle kind of dragged for me. Definitely held alot of important info though. Once the crime happened and the subsequent investigation and court proceedings occurred I wanted to know what went down.
August 13, 2019
I could not put this book down until I finished it! From the minute I started it, I kept having to remind myself the events in this well-written book were actually true. If you keep an open mind, you can see how ordinary people can be led to do horrible things. A compelling story - so sad that it's real.
October 15, 2019
Excellent. Hard to put down, but at the same time so hard to take in the atrocities that come with a person being drunken by the feeling of having power. Having taken place only a few hours away from me, it made it all the more interesting.
I heard the author interviewed on several local radio shows...the work she put into this...the research she made, made it even better. Very impressed (by her) so saddened by how this story came to an end.
I heard the author interviewed on several local radio shows...the work she put into this...the research she made, made it even better. Very impressed (by her) so saddened by how this story came to an end.
February 13, 2022
My local library is starting up a true crime book club. This was the first book that was chosen. It's not something that I would have picked up otherwise. I was so disturbed throughout this book; I couldn't even begin to fathom how so many people got suckered into this "church." I'm not religious anyway, so it was even more difficult for me to understand how the Irwin's brainwashed so many people.
May 11, 2025
Really good and interesting book, kept me engaged the entire time. Occasionally hard to keep the people involved straight, both because there are so many of them and likely because I listened to the audiobook while driving. Asks some really interesting questions about when a religion becomes something more sinister.
July 21, 2025
This is rounded up from a 4.5.
This book is so well researched and detailed. It is always so disturbing to me how easily people get sucked into cults. To get to this extent is absolutely nuts to me, but I appreciate how the author shows you how it was done in a slow and methodical way.
Heartbreaking story while also terrifying the whole way through.
This book is so well researched and detailed. It is always so disturbing to me how easily people get sucked into cults. To get to this extent is absolutely nuts to me, but I appreciate how the author shows you how it was done in a slow and methodical way.
Heartbreaking story while also terrifying the whole way through.
January 23, 2020
Just unbelievable!!
An amazing and complicated story of evil parading as" "Christianity". A young man's life is horribly snuffed out in the name off religion. RIP Lucas. May God hold you and comfort you...something you didn't know existed in this life.
An amazing and complicated story of evil parading as" "Christianity". A young man's life is horribly snuffed out in the name off religion. RIP Lucas. May God hold you and comfort you...something you didn't know existed in this life.
February 29, 2020
This book was a well written documentary about a local tragedy. The Word of Life Church in Chadwicks, NY was the invisible cult, that operated a "Christian" church run by a family that mentally controls it's church members. It's hard to believe that this happened in a close knit community, right under our noses! A 19 year old boy was beaten to death, and his 17 year old brother, also beaten. This happened during an overnight "counseling session".....
September 8, 2019
Even though this is just one little isolated community, the seeds of this kind of brainwashing are imbedded in the whole, which is the result of deifying ancient texts. Sad, really.
February 8, 2020
This book represents incredible research and helps to get into the minds of the church/cult members. It is well-written and concise, and gives the reader a rich understanding of how something like this could have happened.
July 24, 2020
Such a sad and disturbing/sick book
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