Entry one:

Zombie Porter Rockwell sniffed the air. The smell of singed hair slowly triggered the synapses in his decaying brain. He needed brains soon. But he had business to take care of first. He was on the trail of Cain, and this time, he was going to take the hairy wanderer out.

He jiggled the tank strapped to his chest. It sloshed reassuringly — still at least half full. His bulbous, unblinking eyes scanned the dessert. Cain had managed to survive P-Rock’s trap, but little did the large-footed fellow know that fire, which was his only weakness, was now portable. Zombie Porter sniffed the air again and fell into a jerky, but surprisingly fast lope. It was bbq time and [MORE]

Entry two:

The rain always made her sad. It reminded her of her grandmother. It also reminded her of her dead husband. And that cat she had had for two weeks in seventh grade. The rain was coming down in sheets now. It made her feel like the world was crying. She was crying too. But even though she was crying, she knew that she was not alone. The footprints in the sand were not hers. The battered violin that was her soul could still produce a beautiful tune in the master’s hands. So she decided to cheer herself up by firing up her Provo Craft cricut and breaking out her brand new six-inch by 13-inch Cuttlebug Cutting Mats. [MORE]

Entry three:

Truth was a complex, ever-evolving thing for an educated man like Walter C. Habermavinaseiggeridastraullard. Nuance was his watchword. Context his Title of Liberty. Which was why he spent so much time commenting on blogs.

Walter loved his fellow Saints with a pure love, but he also knew that too many of them were in danger of having their simplistic testimonies fall to pieces at the slightest breeze of opposition, the tiniest crack in the correlated shell. In short, they were in need of maturation, and it was up to him to be the sunshine, the water and the soil — not to mention also taking the role of the fertilizer, the pruner and the grafter. [MORE]

(Obviously these aren’t really my entries. Revealing the real ones would be against the rules. Also: you have two weeks to polish up your entries and get them in.)

A New Plea for Fiction

by Scott Hales

The other day, I posted on Facebook that the publication agreement for a review I wrote of Angela Hallstrom’s Dispensation: Latter-day Fiction had come in the mail. Among the comments that followed was one that suggested the book should have been called Latter-day Fiction: Disposable.

Now, I doubt the guy who made the comment had ever read the book—even though I know he’s no stranger to Mormon studies. More likely, his comment sprang from the common misconception among Mormons—and we all know it’s there—that fiction written by Latter-day Saints about Latter-day Saints and for Latter-day Saints isn’t worth reading. Not by anyone over the age of fourteen, at least. And even then, it’s still disposable.

A lot of reasons have been tossed out there for why this misconception exists. Typically detractors reference Mormon fiction’s apparent predilection for cheese, sentimentality, and didacticism—not to mention its “unrealistic” depiction of the world and the easy way it resolves the conflicts (or non-conflicts) that fuel its plots. As proof, they point to the work of someone like Jack Weyland, Mormonism’s great literary scapegoat, and novels like Charly, his supposed magnum opus horrendus.

Now, I may be wrong, but I have a theory that most of these detractors—these dear brothers and sisters who conflate all Mormon fiction with Weyland and Charly—have never read a word written by the guy. More to the point, though, I’d be willing to bet that even if they have—and loathed it—they’ve still never taken the time to see what else Mormon fiction has to offer. In this respect, they’re not unlike teenagers who refuse to watch Raiders of the Lost Ark because they thought Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skulls sucked fry sauce.

Of course, we can’t blame Mormon fiction’s detractors for their ignorance. It’s not like the best Mormon fiction is on the bookshelves at any of the Barnes & Nobles in the Cincinnati area, where I live, or advertised on Amazon.com’s main page. Nor is it always found on the shelves at Deseret or Seagull Books. Too often, great Mormon fiction goes unread because its primary audience does not know how and where to find it.

So the misconceptions persist, and Mormon fiction remains disposable.

But it doesn’t have to—not if we all do our part to bust the Jello mold Mormon fiction has been trapped inside since Sam first kissed Charly. As stated in its Call for Submissions, the upcoming Mormon Lit Blitz has been designed specifically to carry Mormon fiction to the Latter-day masses, the “people who love Mormonism and”—believe it or not!—“love great writing.” What better chance is there to bring great Mormon fiction to readers than a contest that seeks to flood the Bloggernacle with Mormon literature?**

Already we’ve received nearly forty submissions, and we fully expect to receive many more before the January 15^th deadline.*** Today, however, I am making a special plea for fiction submissions that depict contemporary Mormon life—fiction that mirrors the lives of its readers.

Yes, the Blitz accepts—and has already received—poetry and speculative fiction submissions, which I imagine will have a prominent place among the finalists.**** But I’d also like to see the work of some of our best practitioners of “Faithful Realism”—or whatever it is you want to call it—featured as well. So often, Latter-day Saint readers know the Orson Scott Cards, Stephenie Meyers, Ally Condies, and Brandon Sandersons, but they do not know the Douglas Thayers, Todd Robert Petersens, and Angela Hallstroms out there.***** My hope is that the Mormon Lit Blitz will help even out the playing field.

In 1898, Nephi Anderson made a similar plea to readers of The Improvement Era. At the time, members of the Church were largely suspicious of fiction, particularly novels, and worried that it had a negative effect on society. Anderson boldly argued otherwise, challenging the sermonly notions of “the spectacled fathers and mothers” of the day, and praising fiction for its ability to speak to the minds and hearts of the rising generation.

In many ways, Mormon culture is now at a crossroads. Not since the days of Anderson and the Home Literature crowd has Mormon creative work been more accessible to the reading masses. True, official Church publications and printing presses have largely steered away from fiction, but small presses, independent journals, and blogs have done their best to pick up the slack. Sadly, their efforts—and the efforts of talented Mormon writers—go unnoticed all too often.

So, if you write stories about contemporary Mormon life, I plead with you to submit to the Mormon Lit Blitz. We need your work, along with the work of our talented genre writers, to prove that Latter-day fiction is not disposable, is not some reeking piece of candy stuck to the underside of a table in the Cultural Hall.

Through the Mormon Lit Blitz, we have a chance to introduce Mormon fiction to a wider audience. As I see it, we can either seize that chance, however great or small it may prove to be, or let people like the guy on Facebook continue to revel in their misconceptions of and faithlessness in Mormon culture.

Is it not time to stick it to the “spectacled fathers and mothers” of our day?

Notes:

**That’s right! We want to get the entire Bloggernacle involved in spreading the words about the contest. If you write a Mormon-themed blog—no matter the size—and would like to advertise the Blitz in February, contact us at Mormonlitblitz@gmail.com and we’ll put you on the list.

***Contest co-coordinator James Goldberg has already called for a “poetically appropriate one thousand and one” submissions. Do you want to let him down?

****I say “I imagine” because I haven’t read any of the submissions yet.

*****Before I get mauled by all the SF&F folk out there, I should also say that Latter-day Saint readers also ought to know more about the Eric James Stones and Lee Allreds out there.

CALL FOR CONTEST SUBMISSIONS

Now announcing the first ever Mormon Lit Blitz Writing Contest organized by James Goldberg and Scott Hales. Send up to three submissions by 15 January, 2012 to mormonlitblitz@gmail.com for a chance to win a Kindle and more.

What we want:
Short work for Mormons to be published and read online.

The details:
“Short” means under 1,000 words.

“Work” means creative writing in any genre, from literary realism to far future science fiction, and in any form: fiction, essay, poetry, even play or screenplay if you can keep it under 1,000 words. Give us a tiny, polished gem we can show off to people who love Mormonism and love great writing but  “know not where to find” a place where the two meet.

“For Mormons” means for committed Latter-day Saints. Yes, that’s an extremely diverse audience (see the “I’m a Mormon” campaign — and your ward members), but it’s also an audience with distinctive shared values and history that don’t often get attention in creative work. We want you to write something that will appeal to us as people who believe in the sacred, who have ridiculous numbers of brothers and sisters we see every week, who worry about being good and faithful servants no matter what our day jobs are and wonder what it will be like to meet our grandparents’ grandparents in heaven. We don’t need your pieces to preach to us. We do need them to combine your creativity and religious commitment in a way that excites us and gives us something cool to talk about with our Mormon friends.

“To be published and read online” means we’re going to post six to twelve finalists’ pieces on Mormon Artist magazine’s blog (www.mormonartist.net) and then ask readers to vote on their favorites.

One catch: since even 1,000 words can be intimidating on a screen, your piece needs a strong hook of no more than 120 words (or eight lines for poetry) to be visible on the main blog page. Mark the end of your hook with [MORE]. Even our editors will only read further if you’ve piqued their interest.

Submission Guidelines:
Submissions must have fewer than 1,000 words with a hook no longer than 120 words (or eight lines for poetry). Submissions must be engaging to Latter-day Saints and engage with their Mormon identity in some way.

Authors may submit up to three works. Each submission must be attached to an email as a .doc or .pdf file. The selection process is blind, so the author’s name should not appear on the document.

Email any questions and your submissions to mormonlitblitz@gmail.com. Submission emails should contain the author’s name, the titles of each submission, and contact information (telephone number or email address).

By submitting, authors give us the one-time rights to publish their work electronically. Previously published work is OK if you still have the rights to the piece and if it meets the above contest requirements (don’t forget to add a [MORE] tag to the end of your hook).

The prize:
The contest editors will select six to twelve finalists. All finalists will have their short works published online starting in mid-February 2012 and actively promoted across the LDS blogosphere by the Mormon Lit Blitz team.

After all pieces have been published, readers will vote on a single Grand Prize Winner, who will receive a Kindle pre-loaded with LDS literary works, including Parley P. Pratt’s classic short “A Dialogue Between Joseph Smith and the Devil,” Peculiar Pages’ recent Monsters & Mormons anthology, Zarahemla Books’ Dispensation: Latter-day Fiction, the poetry anthology Fire in the Pasture, and recent issues of Mormon Artist magazine.

hppt://www.fake-url-snopes.com/bedlamites

Claim: A group of men, chosen by Satan and made immortal to do
his work on Earth, attack and/or seduce the unwary.

Status: FALSE

Example (collected from the internet): “Holy cow, you guys, the
Bedlamites are REAL!  My roommate’s cousin was visiting and shared
this warning from her Stake President. Last weekend, he was driving
by Yosemite National Park when his tire blew out. While he was trying
to fix it, three men stopped and asked if he needed help. When he
said “yes,” they laughed at him. Then one took out a gun and shot a
hole in one of the other tires. He protested and another took his
tire iron and smashed in his headlights! They were really getting
nasty; they even started hitting him! Thank God he was wearing his
garments. When his clothes got ripped the holy glow from his garments
burned their hands and they dropped their weapons and ran. They MUST
have been Bedlamites! So everyone remember, always be on your guard
and BE WORTHY AND WEAR YOUR GARMENTS!”

Origins: The so-called “Silver Plates,” revealed by Latter-Day Saint
“prophetess” Dinah Kirkham in 1843 include the story of a city called
Bedlam. According to the story, Bedlam was a wicked city on par with
Sodom and Gomorrah from the Bible and, like them, was destroyed for
it. The only “sin” specifically mentioned is that of “un-charity.”
Though what precisely is meant by that is unclear, popular belief has
been that the Bedlamites lived the Law of the Jungle, going so far as
to murder the sick and elderly.

A series of suspicious events and sightings in Utah in the 1850’s,
coupled with a disputable reading of Elisa 11:7, have given rise to
the folk belief that there is a group of men who, like the Three
Nephites, have had their lives supernaturally extended. The
difference is that the Three Nephites are supposed to have had their
lives extended by God in order to bring souls to him, whereas the
Bedlamites are survivors of the destruction of Bedlam whose lives have
been extended by Satan to sow fear and pain and in general do evil.
In the usual fashion of folklore, no one credible can be found who
claims to have actually encountered the Bedlamites. It’s almost
always someone’s father’s brother’s nephew’s cousin’s former roommate.
Also, given the nature of these encounters, it is difficult to assign
supernatural origins to what is most likely plain old human nature.
The temptation to blame events like the Mountain Meadows Massacre on
“the Devil” must be strong, but which is more likely: a posse of
anti-angels or a gang of human thugs?

Heather “silver plates sound hard to keep clean” Harper

Last Updated:
13 April 2011

Sources:

hppt://fake-url-wikipedia.com/bedlamites
hppt://fake-url-lds.org/scriptures/bible_dictionary/bedlamites

For months now, reports have been circulating online of the discovery of a document attributed to Emma Smith discussing certain passages from the Book of Lehi, which of course was written on the 116 manuscript pages infamously lost by Martin Harris. In the letter, Sister Smith mentions a conversation she had with her husband, the Prophet Joseph, regarding the work that he was translating. Apparently she was intrigued by Joseph’s description of certain happenings shortly after the arrival of Lehi’s family in the Promised Land, and referred to these events in her document, which is most likely a journal entry as it seems to have no specific intended recipient.

The story in question is of one Beidl, described in the ancient record as a short, dark, exceedingly round being who entered the camp of the Lehites on an evening. After attracting Laman’s attention, Beidl led a small party back to his home, which was in a “great hole in the rocks” located “a long distance” inland of the camp. Beidl had seemingly been cut off from his people somehow, but his strange language made it impossible for the children of Lehi to understand exactly how.

According to Emma’s report, the Book of Lehi ends by mentioning the marriage of Beidl to one of Laman’s daughters, and Emma speculates that the union with this strange personage may have been the beginning of the curse which plagued the Lamanites ever after.

After finishing her summary of the scriptural account, Emma mentions that during their conversation on the topic, Joseph told her of a vision in which he saw the history of Beidl and Laman. He described Beidl as a “grotesque person with an unusually large nose,” and told of a split among the children of Beidl and Laman, in which the majority stayed with the newly formed group thereafter known as Lamanites, while the remainder, who had inherited Beidl’s unfortunate facial characteristics, went their own way back to the great hole and were referred to generally as Beidlamites.

But all this is old. The exciting new news has only come in the last few hours.

Latter-day Saint archaeologist Moab Young has discovered what he describes as a “Beidl-like” skeleton in the region of Neuquén, Argentina, near the site of the unlisted El Sauce crater. El Sauce, a 20 km wide hole in the ground of unknown age, has been generally thought to be an impact crater, but a lack of convincing evidence for this theory has kept it off the official Earth Impact Database list.

Young’s theory is that El Sauce is, in fact, the “great hole in the rocks” mentioned by Emma Smith and that far from being impact related, the crater is the collapsed entrance to the subterranean home world of Beidl and his mole-man ancestors. The close proximity of the Beidlamites hole to the original Lehite camp suggests that the original landing site may have been much further south than generally thought.

NOTE: Adam has also created a magazine-style version of the story complete with images.

1. This won’t be the only Monsters & Mormons contest. There will be more chances to win as the publication date draws near.

2. Many thanks to our other entrants. We will be featuring your entries here at AMV in the coming weeks. And to quote Th:

I must say that the overall quality of submissions made this the most fun I’ve had today. (Of course, I’ve also been stuck at a car dealership all day over a steering recall. The competition isn’t fierce. But don’t let that subtract from my enthusiasm.)

A Snopes entry? Brilliant idea! The Book of Asherah? Give me more! Little green Bedlamites of Mars? Why not?

Thank you so much, everyone who contributed. I have so many of you tied for second place that I can hardly bear it.

Wm adds: Yes, thank you. Of course, me being the cruel, cruel man that I am — I can bear it. So I’m holding the line at our two winners. Sorry. More chances to win later.

Th.’s Award Citation for Adam:

This story felt so much like a real news article I kept googling some of its elements to see if at least this part were real. The story came together with the right mix of deadpan journalistic earnestness and ennui that I think there’s a solid chance you could pull this hoax off and make people believe it for a while. The way he casually brings in Book of Mormon-geography theory and other elements serve to ground his new tale in already existing crazy and the whole thing comes together in way that feels both blandly real and exotically aesthetic. Which is a long-winded way of saying I like it a lot.

Wm’s Award Citation for Heather:

Nothing quite captures the tone of internet discourse like Snopes — informed, authoritative, footnoted, drily witty, often irreverent or condescending, and sometimes goofy. And Heather packs those qualities in there with her amusing yet almost truthy enough to be real fake Snopes entry. Heather won me over not only with her notion of Bedlamites as a reverse Three Nephites, but by getting the details just so — the fake URLs, the silver plates, the references. Besides what could be more hilariously delightful than debunking something that isn’t real in the first place?

The winning entires will be posted in the coming days. Monsters & Mormons is still in the editing phase. More updates as progress warrants.

——

Like many of you, we were quite taken with Elder Holland’s use of the word “bedlamites” in the Sunday afternoon session of conference. It was an affectionately appropriate term applied to children, one that acknowledges the realities of wrestling with child energies in the daily praxis of Mormonism and nods to the fondness in LDS discourse of the use of the suffix ‘-ites’. It also, of course, evoked all sorts of intriguing ideas for those of us who have Monsters & Mormons on the brain. In fact, Graham Bradley tweeted: “@motleyvision You have to do an M&M volume 2 now, and I CALL DIBS ON THE BEDLAMITES”

Sorry, no plans for volume 2 as of yet. But here’s a chance to win an electronic copy of the Monsters & Mormons anthology. It’s the Bedlamites contest!

Yes, we know that it’s a real, albeit Anglophilic and somewhat archaic word that means the inmates of a lunatic asylum. But what if it wasn’t? What if it was an actual group of somethings/somebodies in Mormon history (of any dispensation)? What somethings? Which somebodies? Well, that’s up to you. But here’s the thing — we don’t want stories. We want fake documentation. It could be a section of scripture, mission statement, strategic plan, ballad, scholarly footnote, article abstract, wikipedia article, OED-style definition and usage/citation history, Bible Dictionary listing, Encyclopedia of Mormonism entry, journal entry, letter, etc. Anything that gives us a glimpse of a hidden or alternate history of the mysterious and/or long-forgotten Bedlamites.

The rules are:

1. No short (or short short) stories. As mentioned, we want you to explore other forms of discourse here.
2. There needs to be some Mormon connection, even if it’s only a tertiary one.
3. Your entry should be 500 words or less, and it should be submitted by 10 p.m. CDT on Friday, April 15.
4. Your entry should follow the tone of this blog – irreverent, odd, witty, obscure, satirical, highbrow, lowbrow, etc. are all okay. Mean or mocking is not.

There will be two winners — one selected by Wm; one by Th. Each winner will receive an e-edition of the Monsters & Mormons anthology when it is published in October of this year.

We also want our contributors to the anthology to be able to participate in the fun should they feel so inclined. Should one of them win, we will randomly select one of the other entries to give the e-book to.

We will be accepting submission only through this Google form. We will publish the winners and probably a few other favorites here on A Motley Vision, but will also make public and post a link to the Google spreadsheet that the form feeds so that we can all enjoy all of the entries. If you aren’t interested in sharing your entry, this isn’t the contest for you. Now on to the bedlam-making!

The nearly 40 submissions, from more than 2 dozen authors, totaled over 100,000 words, more than enough to produce a book-length anthology as planned for this fall.

Perhaps more importantly, the quality of the submissions is quite good. The best of them use rich, well-developed language and well-constructed phrasing. The stories also show great imagination, with plots varying from modern fables to poetic slices of life. Like early Mormon stories from the home literature period, many of the stories are a bit didactic or depend on Deus ex-machina plot devices, perhaps understandable given the fact that the only Mormon stories Portuguese-speaking readers are exposed to are those in the Liahona.

A three-person jury of academics, including a native speaker each from Brazil and Portugal and one familiar with the current LDS book industry, will now choose first, second and third-place winning stories and designate which stories should be included in the anthology to be published later this year. The prize-winners are scheduled to be announced on October 1st. I will translate the first-place story, and I’m seeking a venue where it can be published.

Perhaps more interesting could be the effects following this contest. I have already lined up 4 online LDS bookstores in Brazil to carry the anthology (there are a couple more, one a brick-and-mortar store, that haven’t yet responded to my queries), giving me hope of some distribution of the book beyond friends and family of the authors and whatever online audience I can contact. I expect to publish future volumes in Portuguese, and hope that some of these authors will participate.

In addition, I’m trying to figure out how to create a good forum for the group of authors this contest has attracted — a community that will encourage future writing and help authors to improve the quality of their writing. I’m sure that social media will be used, but I’m open to suggestions for further details. Perhaps some kind of online literary magazine?

Of course, given the response, the contest will likely be repeated next year (unless the sales of the anthology are so small that it isn’t financially viable). And I’m encouraged enough with the results to think that it may be a good idea to start a similar contest in other languages.

What do you think? Is there some aspect of this I’ve left out?

In order to promote and develop Mormon literature in Portuguese, we are pleased to announce the first Parley P. Pratt Mormon Short Story Contest. Starting April 1st, Mormons who write in Portuguese will be able to submit their writing to compete for publication and prizes totaling R$1,000 (Brazilian Reais – approximately $500 or EUR 400).

The contest is the first attempt to encourage development of Mormon literature in Portuguese. Although there have been Portuguese-speaking LDS Church members since the 1940s. Only in the past two decades has the number of members become large enough to see local Mormon culture develop. With a large enough audience, it is now time to see what Portuguese-speakers can produce.

Those interested in writing can submit their stories starting April 1st, and before July 1st. The winners of the contest and those stories that have been selected for inclusion in a published anthology of the best stories will be announced on October 1st. The anthology should be available starting December 1st.

The contest is open to anyone, and each contestant can submit up to three stories of up to 10,000 words, however entries must be written in Portuguese and must have some kind of connection to Mormonism. A three person jury will judge the entries and select both those who will receive cash prizes and those stories that will be included in the anthology. The organizers and the jury and their families are ineligible. [Please read the full rules before submitting an entry.]

Since the contest is only open to works written in Portuguese, the website describing the rules is also in Portuguese. Anyone wanting further information is welcome to ask me – kent [at] motleyvision [dot] org.

LDS Publisher contest

Voting recently opened in LDS Publisher’s Book of Mormon Story Contest. The contest features young adult fiction stories with a Book of Mormon setting by both published and unpublished authors. Theric Jepson and I both submitted entries as did AMV reader/commenter David J. West. A few other AMV readers may also have participated (if so, let us know in the comments). And no, we aren’t going to tell which stories are ours — that’s against the rules.

Now, you may be asking yourself: do I really want to wade through 26 pieces of fiction (16 if you just read and vote for the published authors)? Probably not, but you should anyway — some stories are better than others, but all of them are interesting in how the engage with the Book of Mormon.

AML Annual Meeting

The Association for Mormon Letters will hold its annual meeting this Saturday, Feb. 27, at Utah Valley University Library in Orem. The theme of the program is “‘One Eternal Round’: Mormon Literature Past, Present, and Future” and AMVers Tyler Chadwick, Harlow Clark, Patricia Karamesines and Katherine Morris will all be presenting. So will other folks whose names should be familiar to our readers — in particular: Lisa Tait, Ardis Parshall, Gideon Burton, Angela Hallstrom, Lee Allred and James Goldberg. If you are within driving distance, you should go — not only because of the interesting presentations and excellent company, but also because the meeting will feature a rare screening of the 1931 film “Corianton: A Story of Unholy Love.”