The Four Wives and Five Deaths of Richard Milford by Nafissa Thompson-Spires
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The Four Wives and Five Deaths of Richard Milford by Nafissa Thompson-Spires

Literary fiction

The Four Wives and Five Deaths of Richard Milford

by Nafissa Thompson-Spires

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Quick Take

How many ways can one man die? This inventive literary novel is a study of mythmaking, marriage, and small-town gossip.

Good to know

  • Illustrated icon, Multiple_Viewpoints

    Multiple viewpoints

  • Illustrated icon, Cerebral

    Cerebral

  • Illustrated icon, Whodunit

    Whodunit

  • Illustrated icon, Under200

    Under 200 pages

Synopsis

Rich Milford is dead. At last.

We find ourselves in 1920s Oklahoma, just far enough out of Tulsa, just long enough after the Race Massacre of 1921. For as long as anyone can remember, the Milfords have led plentiful lives on the backs of the townspeople of Newville. Now, on the ominous brink of the Great Depression and at the height of Prohibition, Richard Milford was an infamous moonshiner and womanizer who, it seems, finally crossed the wrong person at the wrong time. He’s dead and buried with only his women to mourn him, but a question remains: Who killed him, and why?

Top suspects are his four “wives,” Lally, Sophronia, Georgette, and Vivianne. But as their stories burst to light, the very idea of a true story comes apart before our eyes.

Content warning

This book contains scenes depicting graphic violence and a miscarriage.
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Literary fiction
View all
Intermezzo
A Season of Light
Liquid
The Book of George
Margo’s Got Money Troubles
Annie Bot
Five-Star Stranger
Mercury
The Other Valley
The Bullet Swallower
Alice Sadie Celine
Let Us Descend
Banyan Moon
Shark Heart
Dominicana
What's Mine and Yours
Ask Again, Yes
Vladimir
Infinite Country
The Many Daughters of Afong Moy
Black Buck
Luster
Paper Names
The Light Pirate
The Half Moon
Valentine
Leave the World Behind
Little Monsters
Yerba Buena
Beautiful World, Where Are You
Free Food for Millionaires
Sing, Unburied, Sing
Whatever Happened to Interracial Love?
Future Home of the Living God
Red Clocks
The Mars Room
Eat Only When You're Hungry
Unsheltered
The Goldfinch
Welcome to Braggsville
Heat & Light
Nicotine
Perfect Little World
Someday, Maybe
Maggie; or, A Man and a Woman Walk Into a Bar
Seduction Theory
The Book of Guilt
A Good Animal
Almost Life
Homebound
Porcupines
Nymph
Games: A Love Story
Everything Was Beautiful and Nothing Hurt
Fallow
American Hagwon
Peck & Peck
The Four Wives and Five Deaths of Richard Milford
Sophie, Standing There