“Built for giants, inhabited by pygmies.” That’s what the legendary Texas politician Bob Eckhardt used to tell awe-struck visitors about the Texas Capitol. The Goddess of Liberty, who stands atop Austin’s dome, peers down 302 feet at the mortals below, 14 feet higher than the U.S. Capitol.

As a University of Texas law student in 1985, I was one of those pygmies. I worked for a 20-something cowboy turned newbie state representative. So, when I encountered Sonny Lamb, I felt like I’d known him for years.

Lamb is the protagonist of Lawrence Wright’s rollicking satire “Mr. Texas.” He is a soldier-rancher-failure who, by way of accidental heroism and a Machiavellian lobbyist, finds himself elected to the Texas Legislature. This is where Mr. Wright’s task becomes daunting: parodying politicians who are, in real life, parody-proof.

When I worked at the Legislature, the speaker of the House was Gib Lewis, a good ol’ boy from Fort Worth who loved hunting and feared polysyllabic words. He was a veritable redneck Yogi Berra. How do you satirize a place where the speaker of the House once said, “This is unparalyzed in the state’s history,” and “I cannot tell you how grateful I am; I am filled with humidity”?

Then there was the freshman Democratic representative I met, a hunky, charming Air Force veteran. He was an Al Gore supporter who wore tight jeans and adjusted himself so frequently we called him Crotch. Rick Perry went on to become a Republican, the longest-serving governor in Texas history and a member of Donald Trump’s cabinet.

Into this deeply weird reality wanders the fictional Lamb, who has won his seat in the Statehouse after his bravery in a fire made him a local celebrity. He leaves his wife, Lola, back at the ranch, but she does not pine or whine. Lola is strong, beautiful, independent. In one scene, she turns young bulls into steers. Sonny has seen combat, but he doesn’t have the stomach for castration. Lola not only cuts the calves; she dines on the residuals.

Ignoring the hint, Sonny is seduced in Austin by power, politics and Angela Martinez, a magnetic young Mexican American Democrat from San Antonio. Sonny is a Republican, and a married one at that. In one of scores of phrases that caused me to cuss myself for not thinking of it, Wright describes their night together as “a moment in which Reason was sleeping and Desire unfolded her wings.”

It is a testament to Wright’s talent that he can take a well-worn narrative arc and bend it in new ways. Sonny, it turns out, is no innocent Lamb led to slaughter. Angela is not a temptress but a complex woman, uneasily balancing ambition and autonomy. The evil lobbyist who facilitates Sonny’s rise, L.D. Sparks, has a poignant origin story, and the all-powerful speaker, Big Bob Bigbee, lives on the border of greatness and madness.