Of course, I am writing mystery novels and when there is a crime like murder, there have to be multiple motives and multiple possible suspects, so in each draft my Stephen became more and more a villain. I do not mean in writing this novel to indict all polygamists everywhere. Perhaps there are some who could come to a more egalitarian polygamy, though I’m not sure what it would look like in the end. While Stephen Carter’s polygamous ideas are loosely based on the claims made by the original leaders of the FLDS church and some of its offshoots, he is his own prophet, as his brother is. This seems to be fairly typical of fundamentalist religions in my study of the history of Mormon Fundamentalists, each group claiming the “true authority” of previous leaders, and pointing the finger at others who have gone astray, even as the mainstream LDS church thinks of all of them as apostates and reprobates.
I should also note that I wrote the first draft of this novel (then called Family Bonds) in 2014 and subsequent drafts in early 2015. By November 2015, when the “Exclusion Policy,” as opponents have begun to call it, was leaked to the press by ex-Mormon blogger John Dehlin, I thought the book was nearly finished. When it came back for plot edits, I found I couldn’t see any way to write this story set in this time frame, with Samuel openly gay and headed on a mission, without having Linda deal with the new policy in some way.
As I went through thirteen more drafts of the book in the next six months, I desperately tried to iron out my own emotional feelings as I wrote through Linda’s. As in other books, Linda is not me, but perhaps she is more like me in this book than she has been in any other. My experience with Mama Dragons mirrors Linda’s, and some of my new friends in progressive Mormonism appear in this book, including Mitch Mayne. These are friends to whom I have clung as I have felt like the walls of my religion have been crashing in on me.
I have also included here a glimpse into my own experience with home birth. I delivered two of my five children at home with a lay midwife, one with a certified nurse midwife in a free standing clinic, one at a hospital with a certified nurse midwife, and one in an emergency transport at a hospital after things nearly went bad at home. My stillborn daughter’s heartbeat was gone before I tried to deliver again with a midwife at home, but I have always wondered if I had chosen to deliver with a doctor, if she might have been induced earlier and saved. This leaves me in a strange position of ambivalence about home birth.
I thought that The Bishop’s Wife was as much a book that exposed myself as I would ever write. It turns out I was wrong. This book is far more personal and has been far more painful and difficult to write than any other. Thank you for reading it and for being willing to sit through this sifting of my thoughts on marriage, religious freedom, gender equality, and ultimately, devout faith. I’m once again trying to be better and more faithful, and mostly failing.
I need to thank my editor, Juliet Grames, for her many drafts of patient editing of this book. Also, Amara Hoshiro, who helped edit early drafts; Jennifer Ambrose Lyford, who did an emergency final edit to fix the ending; and my agent, Jenn Udden, who did several ultra-fast edits to come my rescue, as well. Thanks to the whole team at Soho, including Meredith Barnes, Rudy Martinez, Bronwen Hruska, Paul Oliver, Abby Koski, and Rachel Kowal.