Category Archives: Community Voices

Death of Richard Cracroft

Everyone in the world of Mormon letters will be saddened to hear of the death of Richard Cracroft yesterday, September 20, 2012. A giant has left us. For more details, see the Deseret News obituary.

Posted in Announcements, Community Voices | 13 Comments

The Afterlife of an AML Conference Presentation

This month I couldn’t decide whether to write about the Four Centuries of Mormon Stories Contest or about how my 2012 AML Presentation informed my soon-to-be-available book. So I posted both, and will let you take your pick. In 2010, … Continue reading

Posted in Community Voices, The Writer's Desk | Tagged , | Leave a comment

One Man’s Meditation: Merlin, Motivation and Letting Go

It seems to me that we are in the midst of a rather startling expansion of our traditional concepts of Mormon literature. There’s an active effort going on to expand the possibilities, to rethink what we can and should be doing with our unique voices and viewpoints. A lot of it makes me uncomfortable, but the more I consider it the more I think it’s a useful discomfort… Continue reading

Posted in Community Voices, Personal Narratives, Storytelling and Community | 17 Comments

In Defense of Grumpiness: A Review of “Brothers,” “Quietly,” and A Roof Overhead

Update 18 Aug 2012: In the comments, Mahonri Stewart responds to my critiques of his piece. In the interest of fairness, I encourage anyone who reads this review to also take a look at his comments. I happen to agree … Continue reading

Posted in Community Voices, Mormon LitCrit | Tagged , , , , , , | 42 Comments

Leaps

My opening line: “I don’t know what I’m doing, but that’s never stopped me before.” That’s what I said to a famous filmmaker I was meeting with to get some advice. I’m making a feature film. No, I have never … Continue reading

Posted in Community Voices, On-screen, The Writer's Desk | 5 Comments

Making More Time to Write!

I invited best-selling author and motivational speaker, Connie Sokol, to guest post today. She graciously agreed to share her secrets for making more time to write! I love her ideas and insight and hope you will too. For most female … Continue reading

Posted in Community Voices, Mysterious Doings, The Writer's Desk | Tagged , , , , | 2 Comments

Writing and Community Building

For the last several months I have been the editor of my ward’s monthly newsletter. This experience has been interesting in many ways and I wanted to share a few thoughts about it in this setting. First of all, I … Continue reading

Posted in Community Voices | Tagged , , | 5 Comments

Reader/Writer Connection: Get the Easy Stuff Right

It’s happened to all of us. We’re reading a story and a detail leaps out and slaps us in the face because we know that it’s just not true, and that even cursory research would have shown the folly of the claim. As a reader that drives me nuts because it breaks the illusion and jars me out of the story; it makes me wonder how many other details the author got wrong and undermines my trust in the story. As a writer I know that we sometimes play a little loose with certain facts to accomplish another literary task. Continue reading

Posted in Community Voices, SF&F corner, The Writer's Desk | 12 Comments

Owning Books

A few months ago I left my job at a public library for a new one at an academic library. My former coworkers all contributed to a thoughtful, and rather appropriate, parting gift: a generous gift card to Barnes and … Continue reading

Posted in Community Voices | Tagged , | 10 Comments

“It is the Myth that Gives Life”: C.S. Lewis and the True Myth

Note: I will be presenting this at the Springville Library this Thursday at 7pm, so if you’re interested in coming, don’t read this and come hear it instead. Hopefully, I’ll be even more interesting in person. Many people do not … Continue reading

Posted in Community Voices, Mormon LitCrit | Tagged | 6 Comments