Review: The Polygamist's Daughter by Anna LeBaron

Little known fact about me...I was blessed Mormon when I was born. My mother is Mormon, and originally from Utah. I didn't know this until later in life when I was searching for a baptism certificate before I got married. I didn't grow up going to temple and I didn't know a lot about the faith until I did some research, but technically I was Mormon.

I love genealogy and have been working on our family trees, it turns out I come from a long line of Mormons, and some of my relatives knew with Joseph Smith and made the long journey from Illinois to Utah. Also, there is quite a bit of polygamy in my family tree when it was allowed as part of the Mormon faith.

It was interesting to me to read about polygamy from a more recent point of view, and to learn about the dark side of polygamy, and why it was ultimately outlawed. I loved how Anna told her story and admire her for her bravery in having survived growing up with such a public polygamist father. In many ways she was a normal kid trying to get her parents attention, but her circumstances made it so hard for her to grow up feeling loved and secure in her family. I recommend this book to anyone, polygamist background or not. It was well written and really explored how it must have been growing up in that type of environment. Thanks Anna for sharing your story!

Thanks to the editors and Edelweiss for the advanced readers copy.

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