While many have read the autobiography of Parley Parker Pratt, a classic in early Mormon literature, and recognize him as a remarkable personality and understand that he was a significant influence during the formative years of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormon), the scholarly nature of this present biography of Pratt by Givens and Grow fleshes out the man, adding dimension and context to his life that can only burnish his contributions to the early success of the church.

Pratt had a theological insight that helped formulate and codify many teachings of the church that might otherwise have languished as uncompleted thoughts or ideas of Joseph Smith, the prophet founder of the church. Pratt's contribution was to clarify and give philosophical and theological basis for the teachings, thus assuring the distinctiveness of Mormon teachings as opposed to the standard doctrine of Christianity based on their post-apostolic creeds.

He lived a life of struggle, poverty, persecution and hardship, yet devoted his life to missionary work that touched three continents and many nations, and brought many thousands of converts to the gathering to Zion. He was an ardent polygamist, an attentive father to more than two dozen children, a hard worker in all his undertakings and he was murdered in cold blood as a relatively young man.

The full impact of his personality, his theology, his missionary work, his writings, his life in general, will continue to be assessed for yet many years to come. But this present biography certainly provides the foundation for the work of future biographers of Parley P. Pratt. ( )