Adding this to my LT library makes me want to read it again. The more "modern" intercepts in the novel were definitely less interesting than their past counterparts. I also was interested enough to Google information about Mormons...I don't want to call it fact-checking, but the book is intruiging enough to spur on some individual research. ( )

Take a Chance Challenge
Become a Character: For this challenge, you can read any book you want. However, you have to write about the book as one of the characters from the book.

When Jordan Scott stopped by the jail, I was surprised to say the least. After the release of his mother, I had expected to never see him again. He wanted me to read a recently published book that I had a small part in.

I suppose I should back up a bit. My name is Cunningham, Officer Cunningham, and I am a guard in a Utah prison. Jordan's mother was under my care when she was charged with killing her husband. The scuttlebutt around the jail was that she had finally lost it after spending her life as one of twenty plus wives in a polygamous community called Mesadale. She grabbed a gun and helped that horny bastard to meet his maker.

Now I for one can't begin to fathom any woman allowing herself to be used so abominably as the rumors I hear coming from that town. I always believed those women wanted nothing more than to escape their lives but were too scared and too abused to go about it. But BeckyLyn, that's her name, made me see a scarier side; she didn't want to leave, she loved her husband, and she completely believed in that ridiculous marry many and marry them young crapola of her faith. She sure didn't seem like a woman who had just killed her bastard of a husband, more like a grieving widow. And I guess Jordan saw a bit of the same thing in her since he started his whole hairbrained scheme to find out what really happened the night his father died.

After reading Ebershoff's book, I have to say he did a good job of showing all the various and sundry sides of this complicated issue. I really like how he mixed in Jordan and his mama's story with Ann Eliza Young, a wife of Brigham Young, one of the original Prophets of Mormonism, and with the research of one Kelly Dee, a young woman writing her thesis on the role of polygamy. It was interesting to look at this one subject from so many different perspectives.

Growing up in Utah, I couldn't help but learn about the Mormons, LDS, Firsts, and the such not. They sure did carve out a little religious country all their own out here. The Mormons have made it pretty clear that they do not support polygamy these days, and I was happy to see Ebershoff put that into the book. Most of the Mormons I know are good people who find the practice as abhorrent as I do.

What I've never really understood is how our government can allow the practice of polygamy to continue. Blah, blah, blah to all that separation of Church and State hullabaloo. We were okay with taking away the right for animal sacrifices and drug use, but we let 60 year old men marry their 13 year old nieces? What a bunch of shit. Ebershoff seems to think it's shit too, and I really liked this line he put in the book. He wrote it as if Ann Eliza said it: "And if someone were to say I believe in slavery because it is in the Bible, would you say, go then and be free to practice it?" You said it sister.

Well, I suppose I've talked enough about all of this. I guess I just wanted to say that I think Ebershoff's book is a good read. And I'm more than happy to increase my hours at the prison if we decide to start throwing some abusive, neglectful polygamists in jail.

Officer Cunningham

My Thoughts
I chose Officer Cunningham primarily because I could put my views in her voice with a few tweaks. She was a minor character with no portrayed views on the situation, and I have to admit that I'm stereotyping here based on views of female law enforcement (I just can't see a female officer supporting polygamy). The cussing is a stereotype too, but there you have it. Plus the phrase "bunch of shit" pops into my head every time I think about the government's indirect acceptance of polygamy.

As to the book, I recommend it. The style is unique, the plot-lines fast paced, the history informative, and the themes intriguing.

Other books about polygamy and the FLDS I've read and reviewed include the chosen one by Carol Lynch Williams (fiction) and Escape by Carolyn Williams (non-fiction). ( )

Kudos to Ebershoff for exhaustively researching the roots of Mormonism, then attempting to creatively "marry" historical fiction with a contemporary murder mystery. But both missions cause the book to miss its mark. One would almost to possess a scholarly interest in the origins of the religion in order to stick with the density of material presented, not to mention the form in which it's often served up. Some chapters are essentially research papers. While the dual plots set in different eras was an intriguing concept, it caused continuity problems in many spots. The threads of polygamy just weren't enough to make this a tightly-woven tome. Still, I found some the history quite fascinating. ( )

I'm sorry, I just don't get it. I stuck with it through 3/4 of it and I couldn't stand the jumping around. I didn't like it the whole time I was reading it. I finally gave up after I realized I was disgusted the whole time I was reading it. It wasn't the content. I think it's fascinating, but the style drove me CRAZY!!! ( )

The 19th Wife By David Ebershoff This novel is historical fiction at its best. Ann Eliza Webb Young is the 19th wife of the infamous Bringham Young. In 1874 she leaves him. She writes a memoir and travels America lecturing to enlighten people on how polygamy is destroying the Mormons, destroying women and children and should be against the law in the United States. In The 19th Wife the author intertwines this history (reaching to the very beginning of the Mormons in the early 1800's) and a modern day polygamist murder that has taken place in a small desert town. Jordan Scott is a young twentysomething man that was excommunicated from the Firsts religious group as a teenager. He thought he would never see his family again, but returns when his father is murdered and mother is in jail for the crime. Jordan is determined to find the truth in this drama that unfolds before his very eyes. Jordan is a very likeable character which makes the reading wonderful. Ann Eliza is described in such detail that her voice could be heard. The 19th Wife is a unique blend of ethics, intrigue, relationships, gender identity, love and religion. Are people free to live how they choose and who gets to decide. A book I could not put down and it is neither light nor quick. The only advice I should dispense is that this is fiction based on pieces of history. It is a little confusing at times, just keep reading and do your googling later. Enjoy the ride back in time. ( )