The Lonely Polygamist: A Novel

By Brady Udall
Norton, $26.95, 599 pages

The Lonely Polygamist is the latest offering from Brady Udall, author of The Miracle Life of Edgar Mint. The main character is Golden Richards, a Mormon with four wives and twenty-eight children. With that kind of domestic arrangement, how ironic it is that Richards still struggles with things like infatuation with other women. Struggling in his construction business, Richards has trouble relating to his massive family. Soon, he becomes isolated from them and what ensues is a sort of heartbreaking tragicomic unraveling. Though the subject matter (polygamy) will garner interest, the execution of the novel is equally remarkable. Udall has a true novelist’s gift: he can adroitly switch between comedy and tragedy, a sort of literary high-wire act few writers can do well. Udall possesses a near-perfect ear for dialogue and he has a natural empathy for underdog characters, something he put to good use in his last novel. Udall has a big heart, and so does Golden Richards, despite his many-faceted flaws. Richards has an unusual lifestyle, true, but he remains a man we can relate to and even sympathize with: three-dimensional and thoroughly—tragically—human.

Reviewed by Aaron Stypes