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The Miracle Life of Edgar Mint

3.92 of 5 stars 3.92 · rating details · 3,276 ratings · 579 reviews

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 no...more

Paperback, 428 pages

Published May 21st 2002 by Vintage (first published January 1st 2001)

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Mar 21, 2013 Scott Axsom rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: favorites

Is there a word for that sweet spot a great author hits with the “voice” of his story - the one that lulls you into believing you’re leaving this world and entering his? Some writers hit it, off and on, throughout various works and, if they do it often enough, we ascribe to them the descriptors of greatness. But, what if the writer hits it from page one and never loses it? What do we call it then? Whatever the word, Brady Udall finds it, and keeps it, in The Miracle Life of Edgar Mint, perhaps t...more Is there a word for that sweet spot a great author hits with the “voice” of his story - the one that lulls you into believing you’re leaving this world and entering his? Some writers hit it, off and on, throughout various works and, if they do it often enough, we ascribe to them the descriptors of greatness. But, what if the writer hits it from page one and never loses it? What do we call it then? Whatever the word, Brady Udall finds it, and keeps it, in The Miracle Life of Edgar Mint, perhaps the best debut novel I’ve read.

Many have compared Udall to John Irving, another writer whose work I cherish, but Udall, I think, is the better of the two, at least on this outing. I loved The World According to Garp and The Hotel New Hampshire (among others), but neither brought me to the brink of literary ecstasy, as did Edgar Mint. By the end of this book – and this has never happened to me before – my hands were trembling as I turned the pages.

The story is about a Native American (Apache) boy whose head is run over by a mail jeep, and the monumental changes the event brings to his future. The mere fact of his survival is considered by all to be a miracle (thus, the title, sort of), and I’m always inclined to look for biblical allegory in such cases. In the case of Edgar Mint, those inclinations are handsomely-rewarded.

One would be naturally disposed to assume that Edgar’s survival of the accident was his resurrection but, as Udall makes abundantly clear, we’re not talking about Jesus here but of Lazarus, and the events that constitute the rolling of the stone in front of Edgar’s tomb begin after he survives the accident. So, here’s where the John Irving comparisons undoubtedly arise; Udall takes the reader into a heart-breaking world of bullies and prejudice and, like Irving, he renders it as hilarious as it is distressing because Edgar often finds the outrageous injustice of it all comical himself. After all, he’s survived having his head run over by a jeep, after that, everything else is just child’s play.

Though the book is written in the first person, the author occasionally utilizes the (maddening to some) tool of lapsing into the third person, when describing Edgar’s life. He does it rarely, and seemingly indiscriminately, and I began to wonder why. But Edgar, tellingly, wanders through his harsh world wondering if, perhaps, he’s actually watching someone else’s life, if so much cruelty and misfortune could really be foisted upon one child. And, like anyone who’s ever suffered at the hands of caprice, he begins to wonder if he deserves it; if maybe it’s all his fault. Edgar’s losses brought me to despair again and again and, each time, Edgar would rise up and, together, we’d laugh at the inequity of it all until, finally, I wanted to shout to the heavens, “Enough! Leave him alone!” And then came the resolution to Udall’s brilliant, if emotionally exhausting, work: Then, he rolled the boulder away…

The Miracle Life of Edgar Mint left me with the realization that, despite life’s often capricious cruelty and injustice and ugliness, there is also hope and beauty and love and… resurrection. More importantly, Udall brings home the bare fact that, though fate is patently unfair, the inequity of it is not earned. It is simply one face of a many-faceted jewel. (less)

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Nov 08, 2010 Joel rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2010, 52-in-2010

If there is a fictional trope I could probably do without it is the precocious child narrator. I can only read so many books about weirdly bookish children with a story to tell, or a life of destiny to live. And yet it seems like every time you turn around, there is a new one being trumpeted for its "unique, pitch-perfect voice," sometimes by me. Yeah, maybe I like some of these books (or not especially), and I'm even planning to read one soon that is over 1,000 pages long fergoshsakes. But in g...more If there is a fictional trope I could probably do without it is the precocious child narrator. I can only read so many books about weirdly bookish children with a story to tell, or a life of destiny to live. And yet it seems like every time you turn around, there is a new one being trumpeted for its "unique, pitch-perfect voice," sometimes by me. Yeah, maybe I like some of these books (or not especially), and I'm even planning to read one soon that is over 1,000 pages long fergoshsakes. But in general, nine-year-olds are not super interesting as a rule, and it gets harder and harder to impress me by creating one that is "special" in a way that makes reading a book about her not rather tiresome.

An easy way to get around this is the memoir novel. Sure, your lead is a precocious child. Sure, you want to use first-person voice. Just have it be narration from the character looking back over the years. It will require you to do less jumping through hoops to either write in an affected faux-simplistic style or make your narrator so extra-special that of course he uses big words and makes profound statements about the nature of existence (Jonathan Safran Foer is guilty of both of these annoying habits at the same time). So right off the bat, Brady Udall earns major points for doing just that: letting Edgar Mint tell us about his miracle childhood years after he's grown up and processed it, rather than trapping us in his limited worldview as it happens.

Because I think that would be pretty frustrating: Edgar is a compelling character, but a frustrating one: born into a life of poverty on a Native American reservation and with a brain damaged by a terrible accident (head run over by a mail truck), he has plenty of affected quirks in place from the get-go: with no memory of growing up, he's naive about the world and his place in it; he can't write but loves to type (on an old fashioned typewriter, natch); he constantly wets the bed; because he survived what should have been a certain death, he considers himself touched by God and thus spends a lot of time contemplating religion; &c. It's pretty clear this "miracle life" is going to involve a lot of slightly fantastical adventures (and it does: death-defying scrapes with bullies at a school for orphans, daring escapes in the night, a quest to find his missing mother, living with Mormons). All of this plus a child narrator would be too much to take.

But the adult Edgar proves a very amenable tour guide to this miracle life, allowing the child's POV to breathe while inserting just the right degree of perspective. Udall is also very elegant with his prose; both of his novels are consistently funny and thoughtful in equal measure. That other book is The Lonely Polygamist, which is still my favorite book of 2010 (and which I still haven't reviewed), and that one's a lot better, but The Miracle Life of Edgar Mint is definitely a good start. It drags a bit too much in the middle, which is why I'm knocking it down a star, but the destination is definitely worth the journey to get there: I can think of few books that end quite as satisfyingly. (less)

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May 15, 2009 Ender rated it 5 of 5 stars

I love to be so pleasantly surprised by a book. Reading something like this is difficult, because I struggle greatly with obvious injustice, but there was the constant comfort of Edgar's attitude telling me that it was all okay.

I love the way there was so little happening, and yet so much happening at the same time. I loved the way Edgar seemed to be oblivious to so many little nuances of what was happening, yet, even though he was the story teller, the reader knew EXACTLY what was going on.

It...more

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Carla Eskelsen You must have a greater capacity for human degradation than I do. After suffering through 400 pages of it, I felt so assaulted and degraded that 20 pa...more
Feb 19, 2013 09:40am

Carla Eskelsen (your fine review was what kept me reading after I wanted to put it down at page 153)
Feb 19, 2013 09:42am

Ender Carla wrote: "You must have a greater capacity for human degradation than I do. After suffering through 400 pages of it, I felt so assaulted and degra...more
Feb 19, 2013 11:25am

May 15, 2013 Karen rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: coming-of-age, latter-day-saint, us-multicultural, western-regional

Udall chronicles the life of one odd little boy, Edgar Mint. He is subjective to a number of hardships starting with an absent father and an alcoholic mother, but things go downhill fast for him from there. Most painful are the chapters about his years at a boarding school for troubled Native American kids. He is brutally bullied and either ostracized or coerced into criminal behavior by a couple of hoodlums who are older, bigger and more brutal than he. Year after year people close to him disap...more

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Jan 09, 2013 Julie rated it 3 of 5 stars

Sometimes I lament the limitations of the Goodreads rating system. Three stars means I liked it? Well, I didn't like it. I mostly hated it. Many sections made me cringe. I frequently had to close the book and try to think fluffy-rainbow-unicorn thoughts. And yet it was compelling--well thought-out and well-written. I did struggle with the frequent change in point-of-view. I want to trust that the author had good reason for employing such a technique, some sort of mirror to Edgar's psyche and the...more

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Jun 30, 2011 Gwen rated it 5 of 5 stars

Wow! I thoroughly enjoyed this book. I must admit I was leery for a while, for my mind had no clue as to what little boys and young men think about. It was hard for me to get past the "initiation" type activities of school mates. This book was so intriguing, the author knows how to grab your attention, and equally important, how to hold it. As I read I always have questions and he answered them, all of them. I finally get to add something to my favorites shelf. I will definitely be looking for m...more

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Feb 17, 2008 Leighanne rated it 5 of 5 stars

Certainly the best book I've read in some time. A year or so ago a woman put the book in my hands and said, read this; it's amazing. I filed it away, so innondated as I was with the pile of books-to-be-read. Then a few weeks ago I attended a booksellers conferance and a speaker on handselling referenced it, saying he loved the book so much that he and his bookstore sold 400 in hardcover and 1,100 in paperback. That is a lot of love.
So, I sat down with Edgar Mint one afternoon and didn't move f...more

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Feb 11, 2008 Aaron rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I guess the best way to put this is to say that the things I liked about this novel make up for the things I didn't.
Interesting protagist. Excellent pace. Funny when it should be and kind of depressing when it shouldn't. For the most part, Udall should be given credit for making so much that doesn't seem like it could ever happen seem like a natural progression in the life of his characters.

By the end, however, I was feeling a bit of the old "Oh, come on!" by the novel's turn of events. I was a...more

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Nov 23, 2012 Paul rated it 5 of 5 stars

Having read Udall’s The Lonely Polygamist earlier this year and having been blown away by it (I gave that one also 5 stars out of 5), I knew I simply had to get ahold of the rest of his books and see if The Lonely Polygamist was a fluke of genius or if Udall really IS that good. Well, by the time I was only a few pages into this book, I was convinced that Udall really IS that good. So good, in fact, that he has quickly become one of my favorite authors.

As with Polygamist, this book was one where...more

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Aug 30, 2012 Eliza Victoria rated it 5 of 5 stars

I’ve always wondered how John Irving pitches his novels. They span years, feature a dozen or more characters, and contain stories that cannot possibly fit in a synopsis. A synopsis cannot do his novels justice. A plot outline will only reveal a tall tale with no heart.

Brady Udall’s The Miracle Life of Edgar Mint reminded me very much of John Irving’s novels, and it certainly contains the elements that tall tales are made of. Edgar Mint, half Apache and half Caucasian, is run over at the age of s...more

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Jul 16, 2012 Hannah Jane rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: fiction

What I loved: the moments of brilliance and hilarity. I also loved Edgar's relationship with Art.
What I liked: The first half of the book just zipped by. I couldn't put it down. I even read it standing up in the middle of the dishwasher section at Sears while waiting for my significant other to make a decision (I let him pick out a dishwasher because of this book HOLY CRAP).
What I didn't like: The ending was so rushed. I feel cheated out of over half of Edgar's life. I also did not understand...more

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Feb 19, 2012 Sharon rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: pacific-u-mfa

Udall’s playful, funny, active language is so apt for what I am trying to do, I wish I absorb his technique into my skin. I want to capture the sensory detail, especially smells, the way he does. I love the way he makes analogies that are funny because he puts two objects in the same sentence are incongruous. Another technique for humor is making a long list, building and building, and then stopping, abruptly. Here are some phrases I want to emulate:
* “a biscuit you could hurt somebody with”
* “t...more

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Dec 11, 2011 Kristina rated it 1 of 5 stars

I started this book thinking it was going to be funny, probably because there is a quote on the cover that says "...fall down funny." It's not. It's sad. And horrible. And a little bit more sad and horrible. It portrays the life of a young boy who has a life filled with accidents and abandonment and abuse. All the things that made me cry for all the orphans in the world as a kid. But, in this case, they aren't real. It's fiction.

It is impossible for me as a reader to separate the fictional story...more

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Jun 23, 2011 Claudia Kieselhorst rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: favorites

This is one of those few books that should not have any details disclosed about it - no spoiler alerts, no hints, no outlines or summaries. I would even vote to remove the descriptions from the back covers of every copy in existence. Here's why...

The beauty of this story comes from the reader's innocence and the display of curiosity and interest that occurs with every turn of the page. If I divulged even the tiniest detail, it would surely remove one of the magical sparks of this book, and for t...more

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Jan 29, 2011 Meg rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: fiction

I think I want to give this more like 3.8 stars. This is the story of a half-breed Apache named...you guessed it...Edgar Mint. The book begins with Edgar, aged 7, being run over by a mailman and presumed dead. I liked the book, but for me, everything in it has been done just a bit better in another book - being a teenaged-Indian boy (read Sherman Alexie), life in a Mormon family where the wife is cheating (read Virginia Sorenson), the way boys torture other boys particularly in a boarding school...more

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Jun 14, 2010 Sarah rated it 5 of 5 stars

I have been interested in Udall since I read a review of "The Lonely Polygamist", and decided I wanted to get a preview of his writing by reading "The Miracle Life of Edgar Mint." I wasn't disappointed.

This is an amazing book. I've read comparisons to "The World According to Garp", and I can see the similarities but while Irving's New England-based characters seem to almost become caricatures of themselves, I never felt that way with Edgar.

Edgar Mint's life began on a reservation with an alcoh...more

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May 29, 2010 Cindi rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2010

After reading a review of Udall's newest novel "The Loneliest Polygamist", I was intrigued, did a little research regarding the author and discovered his acclaimed novel "The Miracle Life of Edgar Mint".

Edgar Mint is an authentic and sympathetic character. He is lovable. I found myself rooting for him during all the unfortunate events of his young life. Following an accident in which seven-year-old Edgar's head is crushed by a mail jeep, Edgar is brought back to life and the "miracles" continue....more

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May 11, 2010 Kate rated it 4 of 5 stars

Edgar Mint's childhood mission is locating the mailman who ran over his head as a child. He wants to assure him that he's OK.
This mission is the focus of Brady Udall's The Miracle of Edgar Mint. The author's inspiration to write Edgar's story developed from something much less painful than having his head run over, although possibly equally as dramatic.

The peculiar story that gave Udall the framework to work was sparked when his then girlfriend, now wife, revealed she was dating another man. S...more

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Mar 22, 2010 Denice rated it 4 of 5 stars

I picked this up as an audiobook from Audible.com because Brady Udall is going to be one of the featured speakers at The Festival of Faith and Writing for which I had registered. I'd not heard of the book nor the author, so I wasn't sure what to expect.

Throughout the book, I wavered back and forth between, "Wow. I can't wait to hear what happens next," and "Good Lord, I can't listen to another minute of this." Being one who is not a big fan of profanity or flippant references to sex in a book, I...more

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Feb 16, 2010 Mimi rated it 5 of 5 stars

I started this story on the Amtrak trip back from Montreal, finishing ¾ of the book on that 10 hour journey. The rest took me one more day. Couldn’t put it down!

This is a 5-star tale of Edgar Mint, a young half-Apache whose earliest memory is waking up from a coma which resulted from the mailman running over his head when he was 7-years-old. Abandoned by his drunken mother and left-for-dead by all he knew, Edgar was an orphan left to fend for himself in the worlds of the substandard St. Divine h...more

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Jul 29, 2011 Mark Stephenson rated it 4 of 5 stars

Edgar Mint is the neglected child of an abandoned Apache mother with alcohol addiction and many other problems. His story,told by himself and set mostly in Arizona and Utah, reminded me of Oliver Twist and David Copperfield but without any Victorian restrictions on profanity or sexual content. Mormon missionaries play an important role (and mostly positive) in the coming of age of Edgar. Having been a Mormon missionary, I was moved to read of Elder Turley and Elder Spafford's willingness to serv...more

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Jun 18, 2011 Jessica rated it 4 of 5 stars

I decided to read this book after reading this author's latest book, The Lonely Polygamist, and finding it enjoyable. This one wasn't as good a read for me as the other, and it wasn't until more than halfway through the book, that I felt like it was the very same writing style and humor that had attracted me to this author. That said, the beginning wasn't bad, just different in style from the other book I'd read.

Edgar Mint is mainly a melancholy tale about the sad life of young Edgar, a half-whi...more

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Oct 05, 2009 Chana rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: american, literature-fiction, american-indian

Edgar Mint is an Apache half-breed with an alcoholic mother and an absent father. After an accident, in which his head is run over by a mail truck, he lives in the hospital, then a brutal boarding school for a sad population of nowhere else to go Indian kids, then with a foster Mormon family. The story is so well-written that it feels very difficult to write a review, what can I add to this amazing story. I will say that it made me nostalgic for the time I spent in the Mojave desert as a child a...more

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Sep 28, 2010 J rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: novels

I was watching a friend’s house years ago, needed something to read and picked The Miracle Life Of Edgar Mint from their bookshelf. It became one of my favorites. I’ve loaned it out to people left and right out of my sheer excitement for the book. Somewhere between Udall’s deft use of the language and stunning characterization, Edgar Mint sings. The ups are way up and the downs are below zero and Udall never pulls a punch, perhaps on principle.

Given the quality of this story and the wealth of ma...more

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Jun 25, 2011 Kristen rated it 3 of 5 stars

I'd probably give this 3.5 stars, but it wasn't quite enough to convince me to round up to 4 (so I guess I should say 3.4 starts to keep things consistent mathematically). I read this book because of how much I enjoyed The Lonely Polygamist. There were elements of Udall's that I enjoyed in that book present in this one, but it didn't quite touch the same nerve.

Early on this book reminded me of one of my favorites - A Prayer for Owen Meany - and that might have been a downfall before I even got g...more

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Aug 12, 2009 Marvin rated it 4 of 5 stars

A charming book with a wonderful character, a young half-breed Apache somewhat reminscent of Owen Meany, & writing that reminded me of John Irving. In the opening sentence, we learn that Edgar's head is run over by a mail truck. He miraculously recovers (except that he is never able to write, so ends up pouring out his soul by typing profusely on his manual typewriter). The story is divided between the hospital where he recovers, the Indian boarding school where he's sent (& abused merci...more

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Oct 14, 2012 Alice rated it 5 of 5 stars

I rate this book very high because despite it belonging to a distinct genre that has been worked before, the story and narrator engaged me.
The tradition of picaresque fiction narrated by an unwanted, usually orphaned "wild child", of course, goes back to Huckleberry Finn and David Copperfield, among others. This book reminded me of "Little Big Man", too, in some ways, without the prominent historical events. I found Edgar to be a very engaging main character. You felt for all his misfortunes and...more

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May 04, 2013 Jen rated it 3 of 5 stars

It was difficult to decide how many stars to give this book as there were times I really disliked the book, but other times I couldn't put it down. The book is the story of an orphaned Native American boy's journey through a pretty hellish childhood told through his point of view with humor, hope, and a cast of unique, complex characters he meets along the way. I struggled with some of horrors he endured, but the writing was so well done and Edgar seemed to persevere and never feel sorry for him...more

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Sep 01, 2012 Liz Brownlee rated it 5 of 5 stars

In 2001 I was in Waterstones in Belfast, Northern Ireland on holiday, looking for a book. In a beautiful pile on the floor was Brady Udall's 'The Miracle Life of Edgar Mint'.

I bought it for the title, which appealed to me, and the appeal carried on - the main character, his journey, the adventures, the situations, the subsidiary characters - all unexpected, all strangely believable, all engaging, all appealing.

A fabulous, emotionally gripping story. Couldn't put it down.

This book elevated to t...more

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May 05, 2012 Tim rated it 2 of 5 stars

Brady Udall certainly has cute and comic down pat, but he struggles with the plot and pacing in "The Miracle Life of Edgar Mint."

Treated as a sort of 20th century "David Copperfield" with a Native American in the lead, the novel is amusing and generally well-written, but searches for interesting places to go after its title character, at 7 years old, has his head run over by a mail truck. From there, with Edgar abandoned by his mother, it's a long stay in a hospital with odd roomies, a long time...more

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About Brady Udall

Brady Udall grew up in a large Mormon family in Arizona, where he worked on his grandfather's farm. He graduated from Brigham Young University and later attended the Iowa Writers' Workshop.

He was formerly a faculty member of Franklin & Marshall College starting in 1998, then Southern Illinois University, and now teaches writing at Boise State University.

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“There was one difference I would come to realize, between white kids and Indians. Among white kids there are tattletales everywhere. Indians? An Indian wouldn't tattle to save his own mother. Indians, over the years, have learned the value of keeping their mouths shut.” — 2 people liked it

“I typed becasue I had to. I typed because I was afraid I might disappear." --Edgar Mint” — 1 person liked it

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