Summary and Reviews of The Miracle Life of Edgar Mint by Brady Udall

The Miracle Life of Edgar Mint by Brady Udall

The Miracle Life of Edgar Mint

by Brady Udall
  • Critics' Consensus (8):
  • Readers' Rating (4):
  • First Published:
  • Apr 1, 2001, 384 pages
  • Paperback:
  • May 2002, 432 pages
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About This Book

Book Summary

A miracle of storytelling, bursting with heartache and hilarity and inhabited by characters as outsized as the landscape of the American West.

If I could tell you only one thing about my life it would be this: when I was seven years old the mailman ran over my head. As formative events go, nothing else comes close.

With these words Edgar Mint, half-Apache and mostly orphaned, makes his unshakable claim on our attention. In the course of Brady Udall's high-spirited, inexhaustibly inventive novel, Edgar survives not just this bizarre accident, but a hellish boarding school for Native American orphans, a well-meaning but wildly dysfunctional Mormon foster-family, and the loss of most of the illusions that are supposed to make life bearable.

What persists is Edgar's innate goodness, his belief in the redeeming power of language, and his determination to find and forgive the man who almost killed him. The Miracle Life of Edgar Mint is a miracle of storytelling, bursting with heartache and hilarity and inhabited by characters as outsized as the landscape of the American West.

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Reviews

Media Reviews

Newsweek
Extraordinary . . . Fall-down funny . . . It's like nothing else you've ever read.

The Oregonian
Be prepared to fall head over heels for Edgar Mint . . . a charming and delightful narrator you can't help but cheer on through the end.

The Wall Street Journal
Profound and stirring . . . brilliantly executed.

Chicago
Vibrant, big-hearted . . . A poignant, picaresque odyssey.

Elle Magazine
[An] ingenious tale, which takes its heart from Dickens and its soul from America's great outlaw West.

Los Angeles Times
Marvelous . . . Edgar Mint is nobody's Everyman, but he is the hope and the pain of a child looking for, and eventually finding, a home.

Kirkus Reviews
A remarkably assured debut novel that brings to life a unique world, tells its story with skill, and remains enthralling throughout. A bit of a miracle in its own right.

School Library Journal - Emily Lloyd
Adult/High School-With Dickensian flair and mastery. This novel is a wonderful, wise debut, with a strong story told in language that teens will find easy to embrace.

Author Blurb Junot Diaz
A story that tears at you and calls you back.

Author Blurb Tony Earley
If Dickens had been born in Arizona, he might have written a book like this.

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Read-Alikes

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