When Men Become Gods

March 24, 2008
This ripped-from-the-headlines exposé uncovers the rise and fall of polygamist Warren Jeffs, former leader of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (FLDS). Based on interviews with ex-members, newspaper stories and trial records, it provides a raw and bracing account of Jeffs's sex crimes and fugitive years. Unfortunately, Singular's account is not burdened by nuance or significant attention to history or theology, ignoring important prior research on Mormon fundamentalism and painting all polygamists with the same broad brush. Some of this could be forgiven if Singular's lapses in understanding Mormon fundamentalism were not exacerbated by his frequent tactic of comparing the FLDS to Islamic extremists, which evokes the intended fear response but remains tenuous. However, the book's second half, which hews closely to the chronology of Jeffs's flight from the law and the individuals who helped to bring him to justice, is more balanced than the first. Singular is a strong writer who uses pacing, dialogue and drama to good effect. Readers will find this a troubling and fascinating, if careless, account.

May 1, 2008
As president, prophet, seer, and revelator of the Hilldale, Utah-based Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (FLDS), Warren Jeffs sought to preserve the perquisites of office and the religious practices he inherited from his father and predecessor in office, Rulon Jeffs. His interstate flight to avoid prosecution on charges related to arranging plural marriages between adult men and underage girls (some of them first cousins) in his congregation threatened to disrupt his plans in a big way. Eventually apprehended and convicted of being an accessory to rape, Jeffs resigned his church offices. Singular takes us into Jeffs world and the two-year manhunt for him throughout FLDS territory in southern Utah, in which nineteenth-century attire and inbreeding were the rule. In bringing Jeffs to justice, prosecutors first had to gain access to the isolated, reclusive people of Jeffs empire. They were aided in this by a heroic group of women who left plural marriages and sought to liberate other young women from them, and this story is their absorbing story, too.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2008, American Library Association.)