Joseph in Palmyra is a fictionalized account of the life of Joseph Smith from his birth up to the founding of the Church and the period just before the move to Ohio. It is one in a series of three books, the others being Joseph in Kirtland and Joseph in Nauvoo. Originally a single work, it was separated into three books as the size of the original exceeded 1300 pages, too large for a single volume of this sort.

The always-present danger of fictionalized history is its inevitable failure to distinguish between fact and embellishment. To her credit, Ms. Jensen begins by pointing to those portions of her book which are either entirely fictional or are a re-ordering of non-essential events to aid the storytelling process. If her goal was to present a readable account of those early days, she succeeds rather well.

I found Joseph in Palmyra to be a pleasant read, and helped me gain a better perspective on the human side of Joseph Smith and the challenges he, and his family, endured through those difficult days.

Especially poignant are those portions of the book that deal with Joseph's relationship with his family and, later, with Emma. The reenactments of what home life might have been like were helpful.

If there are to be any criticisms, they are:

1. As with many small press books, the volume is plagued with typos, predominantly unbalanced quotation marks. There were few typos (except as noted in #2, following). This made the narrative portions a little difficult to read.

2. And as with an astonishing number of LDS books, the author seems to have a particular problem with the spelling of books of the Bible. "Revelation" becomes "Revelations," "Ezekiel" is "Ezekial." After demonstrating facility in spelling the names of some of the Book of Mormon characters, such mistakes are unfortunate.

These criticisms aside, Joseph in Palmyra could easily serve as a helpful and interesting introduction to the history of the Church, perhaps for older children, or those just interested in a lively account of those years.

(I've never seen the other two volumes in the series; if the author is on this list, she may know where they might be obtained.)

... nfx v3.1 jeff.needle@general.com