Book dossier

And Then They Were Gone

by Judy Bebelaar, Ron Cabral

Of the 918 Americans who died in the shocking murder-suicides of November 18, 1978, in the tiny South American country of Guyana, a third were under eighteen. More than half were in their twenties or younger. *And Then They Were Gone: Teenagers of Peoples Temple from High School to Jonestown* begins in San Francisco at the small school where Reverend Jim Jones enrolled the teens of his Peoples Temple church in 1976. Within a year, most had been sent to join Jones and other congregants in what Jones promised was a tropical paradise based on egalitarian values, but which turned out to be a deadly prison camp. Set against the turbulent backdrop of the late 1970s, *And Then They Were Gone* draws from interviews, books, and articles. Many of these powerful stories are told here for the first time.