The Oracle's Daughter

The Rise and Fall of an American Cult

By: Harrison Hill

Narrated by: Harrison Hill

A gripping chronicle of the rise and fall of a woman-led cult—and the enduring allure of extremism across America’s turbulent religious history.

On a cool fall night in 1999, twenty-six-year-old Sarah Green crept out of her house, retrieved a backpack from its hiding place, and ran for her life. She was escaping not just the Aggressive Christianity Missions Training Corps, a paramilitary religious cult operating out of the New Mexico desert, but also the punishments and cruelty of the cult’s leader—her mother, Deborah.

In The Oracle’s Daughter, Harrison Hill traces the fascinating beginnings and violent end of ACMTC, from its early days as an outgrowth of the 1960s counterculture to its descent into conspiracy-fueled abuse. This is the story of three women—Deborah, the group’s founder and self-proclaimed oracle; Maura, one of its first members; and Sarah, Deborah’s daughter—bound together by a punitive, baroque set of radical beliefs and practices, including exorcism, kidnapping, and the horrific mistreatment of those who fell out of the leaders’ favor. With a dramatic, deeply researched narrative tracing the strange twists and turns of the country’s religious development, The Oracle’s Daughter illuminates the porous boundary between the fringe and the mainstream—and shows how much more vulnerable we are to extremism than we might like to think.

A very good account of the cult’s horrific abuse and the strength to survive.

This is an account of the horrific abuse of a former member of a cruel religious cult. It’s her story, as well as accounts of abuse to other adults & sadly the children. What comes through is the inner strength & courage the survivors find to leave & move forward. The author is the narrator and is excellent.

Such strong reporting and storytelling.

Hill does a fantastic job of being incredibly objective in his telling of this real life horror story. I’ve read and listened to so many books on cults and this one is right up there with John Krakauer’s Under the Banner of Heaven. So compelling and well-read!