Ruby Ridge

A stunning job of reporting.New York Times Book Review

Updated with new content, #1 New York Times bestselling author Jess Walters classic work that chronicles the 1992 confrontation at Ruby Ridge between Randy Weaver and federal law enforcementa tragic eleven-day siege that became a symbol of government overreach and fueled the rise of Americas radical right.

On the last hot day of summer in 1992, gunfire cracked over a rocky knob in northern Idaho, just south of the Canadian border. By the next day three people were dead, and a small war was joined, pitting the full might of federal law enforcement against one well-armed family. Drawing on thousands of pages of documents and extensive interviews with members of Randy Weavers family, government insiders, and others, Jess Walter traces the paths that led the Weavers to their confrontation with federal agents and led the government to take extreme and unprecedented measures. But as the past thirty years has shown, the standoff at Ruby Ridge would not be an isolated incident.

This is the story of what happened there: the tragic and unlikely series of events that destroyed a family, ended FBI careers, and left a nation increasingly attuned to the dangers of unchecked federal power. It is also the story of the racism, religious zealotry, paranoia, fierce hatred of government, and violence that has become increasingly visible across American society.