Mette Ivie Harrison has written two previous Linda Wallheim mysteries, THE BISHOP’S WIFE and HIS RIGHT HAND. Her latest in the series, FOR TIME AND ALL ETERNITIES, takes place in rural Utah and introduces the subject of modern-day polygamy. Harrison has researched the history of the Mormon Church, herself a practicing member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. She knows her subject and produces thought-provoking ideas that secular readers can ponder.

When Mormon bishop Kurt Wallheim and his wife, Linda, welcome their adult son, Kenneth, home, they receive wonderful news. Kenneth has proposed to his love, Naomi, who has accepted. However, Naomi comes from a background of “plural marriage.” She does not condone it or believe as her parents, but feels it necessary that Kurt and Linda meet her family. Dr. Stephen Carter, her father, extends the olive branch for the Wallheims to visit his compound, far outside Salt Lake City. As an officer of the church, Kurt is reluctant to go, but Linda convinces him to accompany her. She feels that in deference to their future daughter-in-law, the visit is a social obligation.

"Harrison has researched the history of the Mormon Church, herself a practicing member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. She knows her subject and produces thought-provoking ideas that secular readers can ponder."

Kenneth chooses to leave the organized church and declares that Naomi feels the same way. They will not marry in the Salt Lake Temple. Kenneth’s brother, Samuel, is on a one-year obligatory mission trip for those his age and will miss the ceremony. With both her sons grown and out in the world, Linda worries for their safety. She is aware of Samuel’s confusion in trying to accommodate his emotional and sexual orientation to the rigid tenets of the Church of Latter-day Saints. At the close of his mission tour, she knows that he, too, will most likely leave his childhood faith behind. Kurt will be heartbroken, for sure, but will side with the Church on the volatile issue of the LGBT lifestyle. Now, he tells her that Kenneth is marrying a product of polygamy to throw it in their faces, but she disagrees.

When Kurt and Linda arrive at the gated compound, a somber-faced woman greets them, clearly in the midst of talking to a young girl. Numerous children cavort and play both in and out of the house, waiting until dinnertime. Five wives and 22 children share the compound with Stephen, and Kurt is visibly overwhelmed by the sheer number of individuals living there. Stephen invites the Wallheims to sit down for a chat, but the words he speaks are a monologue, an explanation (with footnotes) of his belief system. Linda feels like a schoolgirl in a lecture hall, while Kurt boils with exasperation. A lay reader like me absorbs enough of the Mormon history to feel informed, but Stephen’s zeal for his chosen path comes close to indoctrination. Harrison has given me too much information.

Kurt has had enough and tells Linda he cannot stay. They get into an argument, and he leaves. After an uncomfortable night with no sleep, Linda welcomes Naomi and Kenneth. Sarah, the younger sister of Stephen’s wife, Rebecca, shows little love or kindness to her daughter, Talitha, and is belligerent toward the other wives, especially Rebecca. She has love only for her painting, done in an outside shed that remains locked when she’s not working there. The four other wives are a hodgepodge of personalities, including a younger runaway from another polygamous colony and a very young girl, pregnant with the next Carter offspring.

At one point, a loud scream sends Linda and Naomi racing upstairs to the master bedroom, where they find Rebecca crying and rocking back and forth. She crouches over a body on the floor, attempting to wrench something from a bloody chest. Dr. Stephen Carter lay dead. From that moment on, Linda goes into crime-solving mode, her technique of busybody and snoop up to the challenge. Even Stephen’s burial becomes an illegal act. Rebecca insists that the sheriff not be called, as the compound is on the edge of the law at best. Polygamy may be the underlying cause of the crime, and opening the lives of all to scrutiny becomes Linda’s quest.

Ultimately, Linda can’t take credit for the solution, but has done the dirty work for the local law. Many layers are uncovered in the search, and she comes to terms with emotional issues she faces in her own marriage as well. FOR TIME AND ALL ETERNITIES reads like a “cozy” about a moral issue.