You are right that straw men are good examples of what I’m talking about. And they are a particularly bad problem in some fiction.

But, I think that many of the blatant errors in fiction that trip us up are part of the setting of the story, and aren’t things that the author has set up to be knocked down later.

The issue here is, IMO, verisimilitude — how much like reality the story is. These blatant errors interrupt our willingness to accept the story as “true.”

But regardless, you are right that The DaVinci Code falls into this problem, as do many other works.

This is why I couldn’t bring myself to finish The DaVinci Code. The first “flashback” scene that’s intended to convince us that our character really is an Art History professor accomplishes exactly the opposite. His misunderstanding not only of scholastic jargon in the field and the actual name of the field (”symbology” is not an academic discipline) but the basic feel of a college course in the subject totally discredited any attempt he was making to look like an expert. And that’s pretty key in a book where your main focus is to overturn major world religions based on art history. You should at least find out what art historians call themselves.

C.L. Hanson makes a most relevant point – the issue here is the creation of straw men, and can be seen in inferior fiction of all sorts.

Also: I mistakenly read your last sentence as “Mormon and emo characters…” at first. Now there’s an idea for a story: the lead singer of My Chemical Romance falls in love with a sister missionary from Rexburg. ;-)

Along the same lines of non-Mormons writing things that are false about Mormons, a lot of LDS authors don’t bother to try for realism when portraying Mormon apostates. I talked about this in my post Subtle (but important) details…. I’m not just picking on Mormons here: regardless of one’s ideology, there’s a great temptation to set up straw men for your hero to defeat. But the less realistic your conflict is, the less chance your story has of resonating with anyone who doesn’t already strongly agree with you and share your same prejudices. That’s not a problem if you’re shooting for insular literature, but I don’t think you are.

As a hobby I often test read unpublished manuscripts and give feedback, so if anyone here is writing a story that includes Mormon apostate characters (whether Christian, atheist, or other), I’ll be happy to check it for you. Just email me chanson dot exmormon at gmail dot com. And don’t worry, I won’t just say “You need to make the exmo characters more virtuous and turn the Mormons into the bad guys.” ;) I’ll give specific feedback on the details.

Similarly, if anyone here is interested in test-reading my new novel, you’re welcome to do it. It has both Mormon and exmo characters in it, and it features a thriving Mormon ward in a foreign country as well as a character who converts to Mormonism during the course of the story. It’s a comedy, though, so it doesn’t include any serious discussion of theology or doctrine.

And, I’m afraid I’ve met plenty of “Molly Mormons” here in New York City — although they often don’t stay more than a few years.

I know that isn’t terribly helpful, but I’m afraid that just because the book is set outside Utah or the Intermountain West doesn’t mean that it won’t still have a lot of the Utah culture embedded in them.

Fortunately, I think there is a point of diminishing returns in trying to figure this out. There is always a spectrum of belief out there, but it is usually the largest and most talked-about and taught beliefs that have the potential to get you into trouble. More obscure beliefs generally don’t get you into trouble, especially not if you are writing fiction and can claim that it is the belief of your character, and not you the writer. (But this only works on more obscure beliefs. Get a Mormon character with beliefs that aren’t orthodox and you’re back in the controversy.

Also, if its a minor issue or more obscure doctrine, don’t stress too much. Remember that controversy sells books!!

Typos and the like are, of course, inevitable. I actually wish more of my customers would let me know of errors in my books. I cringe ever time I find one. [And I found one just today -- and an error in the table of contents too! ouch!]