This mini-essay explores how fear is used to control a small religiously fanatic community in "The Rapture of Canaan" by Sheri Reynolds.

Using Fear to Control
Herman Langston dominates the isolated South Carolina community of believers, enforcing rigid behavioral laws and meting out harsh punishments for transgressions. This journal will discuss how he wrongly uses fear to govern, and ultimately control the community of the church of Fire and Brimstone.
The tribulation, according to Grandpa Herman, founder of Fire and Brimstone, will be an ugly time: "He said that we'd run out of food. That big bugs would chase us around and sting us with their tails... He said we'd turn on the faucet in the bathroom and find only blood ru…