Struggling with research

My book, 'Sanctuary House' (subtle plug eh???) is about a girl's childhood in a cult house.

My research has taken me in all directions, but most recently I've spent many happy hours looking at grim documentaries on youtube about Jim Jones (of Jonestown 'fame') and various other barking mad cult leaders, such as the Heaven's Gate one, whose madness shows in his manic eyes. If you want to become a cult leader, it's easy to get a step by step instruction manual cataloguing qualities which are most effective. I'm a bit worried I'm going to be reported by whoever it is that monitors computers and finds paedophiles etc. I know quite a lot about cyanide now, including how much you need to kill someone. Haven't yet found how to get hold of it, so if anyone knows, please tell me. I promise this is for the sake of my art only.

I recently realised how important thorough research is whilst reading a book about a cult (that's all I read at the moment, this one is fictional, like mine). I was enjoying it, the balance of tension and humour was good, the characters believable - it had all the hallmarks of a good read. Until the end, when one finally met the cult leader, who'd been deliberately kept in the background the whole way through, and he was this old man with lung cancer, alternately sucking on a Gaulloise (if that's the way you spell it) and his oxygen tank. Having lived through my stepfather's lung disease, I know that if you smoke when an oxygen tank is around you will cause an explosion. It's a complete no no. This mistake made me regard the whole book with less respect, and I began to question whether there might not be other obvious flaws. A pity, and just goes to show how one must be extremely diligent about facts. There's always someone who will know more than you and revel in pointing out that you got it wrong! So, thank God for google and youtube and the whole web bit. I may yet become a computer geek.