Jonestown Revisited

When Rose Laub Coser and I wrote about the Jonestown tragedy (in Dissent, Spring 1979), the sources of our interpretation were limited to journalistic accounts. I was therefore eager to turn to these two books hoping that, with the distance of some two years, they would provide a more searching account of these horrifying happenings. I am sorry to have to say I was disappointed.

James Reston’s book is worth reading largely because, owing to a suit based on the Freedom of...