End of Days - by Chris Jennings (Hardcover)

Book Synopsis

The gripping story of the Ruby Ridge siege, showing how the historic standoff between federal agents and a white-separatist family set the stage for the conspiracy-laced politics of the Trump era.

On August 21, 1992, shots rang out while federal agents were surveilling a cabin in Boundary County, Idaho as part of an operation to arrest Randy Weaver--a reclusive, mountain-dwelling survivalist--for failure to appear in court on a gun charge. When Weaver finally surrendered to the authorities eleven days later, his wife, son, and dog lay dead, as did a US Marshal. Ever since, America has been trying to make sense of what happened on Ruby Ridge. Today, the question could not be more urgent, as the shock waves from Ruby Ridge have amplified and compounded, cracking the very foundations of our democracy.

In End of Days, Chris Jennings explains the significance of this historic siege by setting the story of the Weaver family within the long history of apocalyptic Christianity in the United States, illuminating the ways in which that faith has gradually transformed the nation. The strain of doomsday Christianity that gripped the Weavers, he shows, was grounded in a particular reading of biblical prophecy that can be traced back to the 1870s and up through the twentieth-century rise of Christian fundamentalism to the right-wing conspiracism that now defines American society and politics. The events at Ruby Ridge acted as an accelerant for this spreading worldview, and are essential to understanding the crisis that our nation confronts today.

Review Quotes

"In this vivid, frightening, and fascinating account of the 1992 siege at Ruby Ridge, Chris Jennings reveals how the long history of apocalyptic faith and end-of-times theology have fueled wild conspiracy theories in America. If you want to understand our troubled and fraught times, you need to grapple with the forces that led to Ruby Ridge. This book blew me away and opened my eyes."--Walter Isaacson, author of THE CODE BREAKER and ELON MUSK

"Vivid, absorbing, and elegantly narrated, End of Days explores American fundamentalist religion, with its apocalyptic visions of carnage, through the remarkable story of the Weaver family. The conspiracy theories of today, as Jennings makes clear, are rooted in the demon-haunted world of yesterday's zealots."--Katherine Stewart, author of THE POWER WORSHIPPERS and MONEY, LIES, AND GOD

About the Author

Chris Jennings is the author of Paradise Now: The Story of American Utopianism (2016). A former editorial staffer at The New Yorker, he grew up in New York City and graduated from Deep Springs College and Wesleyan University. Jennings lives in Northern California with his family.