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?

2009 was a very good year for poetry. I’ve identified 8 new titles published since last year’s list. In addition, seven titles by Karen Kelsay, who let us know about her poetry last year, are included on this year’s list.

The only downside is how difficult it is to get some of these titles. Last year, when I learned that BYU would issue The Complete Poetry of Eliza R. Snow, I ordered a copy from Amazon.com. Three months later the book still hadn’t arrived — BYU never sent it to Amazon. When Amazon canceled the order, I ended up purchasing the book from a dealer.

Unfortunately, this isn’t unusual. BYU normally does this with the books they publish — and the new edition of Discoveries: Two Centuries of Poems by Mormon Women, also released last year, doesn’t even appear on Amazon–or anywhere else for that matter.

Another of the new volumes released last year, Mary Lythgoe Bradford’s Purple, also isn’t available from anywhere but the publisher, Dialogue. But unlike BYU, this is likely because of Dialogue’s relative inexperience in distributing books. In addition, many of the titles published using Lulu, the vanity printer, such as R. A. Christmas’ When it Snowed in Pasadena, released last year, also don’t appear on Amazon or other major sellers, probably because the authors don’t know about  alternative printers and distributors who can sell on Amazon at a reasonable price (Lulu charges extra to sell books outside its own website).

The problem with this is, of course, that the titles that don’t make the national distribution network, and through this network appear on Amazon.com and other major booksellers, are hard to find and remain unknown to most of their potential audience. For that audience, its as if the books were never published.

Again this year I tried to be thorough. I’ve compared the authors on this list to those in the Mormon Literature and Culture database, to Andrew Hall’s superb review of what was published in the last year, and last year’s posts and comments about poetry here on A Motley Vision. Of course, it is possible, if not likely, that I have missed something. Please let me know.

Poetry in Print:

• Aitken, Neil. The Lost Country of Sight
• Anderson, Susan Noyes. His Children
• Beeson, Sam. The UnValentine (for children)
• Bennion, Mark D. Psalm & Selah: A Poetic Journey Through The Book of Mormon
• Bradford, Mary L. PURPLE: Poems by Mary Lythgoe Bradford
• Bushman-Carlton, Marilyn. On Keeping Things Small: Poems
• Carabine, Sue. Missionary’s Night Before Christmas (gift book — she has done a whole series of XXX’s Night Before Christmas books)
• Christmas, R. A. A Long Spoon
• Christmas, R. A. City of Roses
• Christmas, R. A. Driving on the Lake Bed
• Christmas, R. A. Housebroken
• Christmas, R. A. Hungry Sunday
• Christmas, R. A. The Kingdom of God–or Nothing!
• Christmas, R. A. When it Snowed in Pasadena
• Collings, Michael R. All Calm, All Bright: Christmas Offerings
• Collings, Michael R. Dark Transformations: Deadly Visions of Change
• Collings, Michael R. In the Void: Poems of Science Fiction, Myth and Fantasy, & Horror
• Collings, Michael R. Naked to the Sun: Dark Visions of Apocalypse
• Collings, Michael R. The Nephiad: An epic poem in twelve books
• Hamblin, Laura. Eyes of a Flounder
• Hatch, Warren. Mapping the Bones of the World
• Hindmarsh, Ted C. Campfire Verses (for children)
• Howe, Susan Elizabeth and Sheree Maxwell Bench. Discoveries: Two Centuries of Poems by Mormon Women
• Jepson, Eric W. et al. Plain and Precious Parts from The Fob Bible
• Jepson, Eric W. et al. The Fob Bible
• Johnson, Kimberly. Leviathan With a Hook
• Johnson, Kimberly. A Metaphorical God: Poems
• Kelsay, Karen. Buttercup Garden (ebook for children)
• Kelsay, Karen. Karen Kelsay Collected Poems
• Kelsay, Karen. A Fist of Roots
• Kelsay, Karen. Forever in Avalon
• Kelsay, Karen. In Spite of Her
• Kelsay, Karen. Somewhere Near Evesham
• Kelsay, Karen. Song of the Bluebell Fairy
• Larsen, Lance. Backyard Alchemy: Poems
• Larsen, Lance. Erasable Walls
• Larsen, Lance. In All Their Animal Brilliance: Poems
• Liu, Timothy. Bending the Mind Around the Dream’s Blown Fuse (As I understand it, Liu no longer considers himself Mormon)
• Liu, Timothy. Burnt Offerings
• Liu, Timothy. For Dust Thou Art
• Liu, Timothy. Of Thee I Sing
• Liu, Timothy. Polytheogamy (Poet/Artist Collaboration)
• Liu, Timothy. Say Goodnight
• Liu, Timothy. Vox Angelica
• Pearson, Carol Lynn. Beginnings & Beyond: An Anthology of Poetry
• Pearson, Carol Lynn. In Love Again and Always
• Snow, Eliza R. (edited by Jill Mulvay Derr and Karen Lynn Davidson) Eliza R Snow: The Complete Poetry
• Swenson, May. Centaur, The (for children)
• Swenson, May. The Complete Love Poems of May Swenson
• Swenson, May. Dear Elizabeth: Five Poems & Three Letters to Elizabeth Bishop
• Swenson, May. May Out West
• Swenson, May. Nature: Poems Old and New
• Swenson, Paul. Iced at the Ward, Burned at the Stake
• Talbot, John. The Well-Tempered Tantrum
• Tanner, Javen, Curses for Your Sake

—-

Out of Print:

I did not find any of last years books that went out of print this year.

That might be a simplistic explanation, and perhaps doesn’t cover all aspects of the problem. I’ve tried to discuss the problems with Deseret Book in the past (see The problem of Deseret Book Part 1: A Question of Size, The Problem of Deseret Book Part 2: A Question of Focus, The Problem of Deseret Book Part 3: Unresolvable? and Bad Move, Deseret Book). Let’s come up with some ideas for other ways to get LDS books to LDS consumers, especially those in areas not served by LDS stores.

Alternative distribution has, of course, a significant hurdle to overcome, simply because the first idea on how to find an LDS book is to go to an LDS store, although searching an online site like Amazon.com is becoming a strong second place.

The alternatives below are mostly things that publishers could implement to sell their own books, but they would be better implemented by independent companies that sold the books of all publishers. They could also be implemented simultaneously. Some don’t even exist at the moment, even in the U.S. national market. This is probably true for a reason–bookstores are probably more efficient than those that don’t exist. But even these might be right for the LDS market because bookstores are often far apart or don’t even exist in many markets. Some alternative need to be used in those cases.

Here are some alternatives:

• Amazon and other online retailers: Already Amazon carries the vast majority of LDS books, and many other  online retailers are not far behind.
  Pros:
  • Online retailers usually have very large audiences, much larger than Deseret Book and all LDS stores together.
  • It is relatively easy to get books listed on most of these retailers.

  Cons:

  • LDS Books are often hard to find because the books aren’t labeled as LDS in any way. While Amazon does have an LDS or Mormon category, it is only for books whose subject is Mormonism.
  • Each title is one among as many as 5 million or more.
  • Authors and publishers still have a significant amount of promotion work to do to let consumers know that the book even exists.
  • Only 10% of sales end occur on line.
• An Independent LDS Online Retailer: By this, I mean a retailer independent of Deseret Book.
  Pros:
  • Depending on how the retailers policies are set up, it should be easy to get books included in its catalog.
  • As an LDS store, its organization would be more like that of brick and mortar online stores, and the items it carried would all be identified as LDS.
  • The store’s selection would probably be better than brick and mortar LDS stores.

  Cons:

  • Since no such store exists, sourcing LDS books might be a problem, especially if major LDS publishers choose not to sell to the store.
• Book Clubs:
  Pros:
  • Sales are mostly easier-to-handle bulk sales.
  • Book Club consumers are often quite loyal and sophisticated.

  Cons:

  • There are probably not many clubs, so the sales they represent are marginal.
  • The require a lot of organization and interest by consumers.
  • Authors or publishers need lists of clubs to market to or ways of identifying the clubs.
• Book Fairs/Event Sales:
  Pros:
  • Its easy to meet large groups of people at events, and often many sales can be made in a short period of time.
  • Book fairs can be very attractive to groups wanting to use them as fundraisers.

  Cons:

  • Book Fairs can’t really be done in Wards and Stakes anymore, given Church restrictions on fundraising.
  • The number of regular events each year isn’t very large–it is difficult to build a business just on that.
• Direct Marketing (aka catalog sales):
  Pros:
  • Relatively easy to set up and administer.
  • Effort needed is in growing and maintaining mailing list and pesenting materials.

  Cons:

  • Requires building a mailing list of 10,000 names or more to make significant sales.
• Person to Person Marketing (representatives in each ward/stake):
  Pros:
  • Would probably give the best coverage of the market.

  Cons:

  • Just to cover all LDS stakes would require more than 1,000 representative.
  • Sales in a single stake may not be enough to support a full-time representative.
  • Turnover and getting reps to do what is needed would be a significant management headache.
• Multi-level Marketing:
  Pros:
  • Allows growing a network of representatives quickly.
  • Also brings in sales quickly and maybe at a higher rate than other things.

  Cons:

  • The margins available to pay representatives may not be high enough to support a MLM network.
  • Many people consider this sales model to be ethically questionable.

I don’t know if the above will help authors or publishers directly. I hope it will. It could also give publishers, authors and others ideas for what to do to build their sales. Better yet would be if this led to an idea to improve and strengthen the independence of the LDS market.

But in thinking about David’s post, I can’t help but remember that promotion can also be used in the wrong way. In the Mormon context, publishers and authors face significant cultural and ethical dilemmas in promoting their work.

Frequently Church members assume that if cultural works have been produced to further the gospel, they should be given away for free, or at low cost. While there is certainly a role for giving works away for free, there are also significant disadvantages to giving works away for free. Probably the major disadvantage is the lack of promotion — unless someone is promoting a work, the number of copies distributed is very limited; and when a work is given away for free, there are rarely any funds available for or effort put into promotion.

Given the need for some kind of promotion, it is no surprising the efforts that publishers and some authors go to in promoting their work. Any promotion at all sometimes feels like its ethically wrong. And since the Church prohibits using its facilities and member lists for commercial purposes, most promotion aimed at LDS Church members seems somehow wrong. While not quite priestcraft, is it wrong to use the fact of Church membership to earn money?

While that dilemma is in the back of the minds of publishers and authors, they also struggle with the dilemmas associated with the text itself, especially, should the text be crafted for a particular target audience? If an author does so, has he remained true to his muse? What if instead the elements targeted to an audience aren’t crucial to the message or ideas in the work? If I want to target college-age LDS women at BYU, should I work in a BYU angle, even if the book is set in Europe?

Many dilemmas that we face in life come down to simple conventions in our community — that is, what our friends and neighbors, helpers and customers, expect. But successful promotion often relies on the unexpected. One graphic design book I read years ago said that the key to great design is knowing all the rules of good design, and breaking at least one. Promotion is also like that — these days if you don’t break one of the rules, no one pays attention. But there is an art to knowing which rule to break, since many of these rules will either yield ethical dilemmas or turn off the audience.

Over the years, I’ve seen a number of promotional efforts used by LDS publishers and authors, some of them seemed questionable. Here are some examples:

* Prospecting at church — talking to anyone who will listen about your work, so that you can judge their interest and call those interested later to make a sale.

* Simply letting others know about your latest work — in the hope that they will look for it later.

* Handing out business cards or flyers, or posting them on bulletin boards.

* Reading passages from your work in classes, at firesides or homemaking meetings.

* Giving presentations on the same subject (but not necessarily mentioning the book) in classes, at firesides or homemaking meetings.

* Collecting email or physical addresses from Church directories because “I know them personally, I’m just looking up the address of a friend.”

* Years ago, I saw one Internet-based promotion in which  Church members were asked to give the advertiser the name and address of their Bishop.

I’m sure you that read this post will know of other promoting techniques, both ethical and not. I’d be very interested to hear them. What techniques have you used or heard of?

When the LDS Church published its own edition of the King James version of the Bible in 1980, Church leaders claimed that it was a significant achievement. The edition included extensive and better organized footnotes than those in other editions of the Bible. It also featured a lengthy Bible Dictionary and a Topical Guide (originally published as a standalone volume). At least LDS Church members (and other, non-members, if my memory is correct) hailed its publication as a valuable study tool. [Obviously, its inclusion of citations to other LDS scriptural works and the LDS concepts included in the Bible Dictionary and Topical guide prevented others from adopting this edition or showing much interest.]

At the time, it seemed obvious, at least to me, that similar LDS editions of the Bible in other languages would eventually follow. But more than 25 years later, we still have yet to see an LDS edition of the Bible in any other language.

To the casual observer, an LDS edition of the Bible in Spanish and in Portuguese would seem like a no brainer. The Church uses old, well-known protestant translations simiar to the King James translation used in English. By their age, both should be in the public domain (the Reina Valera translation, used in Spanish, was completed in 1602, while the João Ferreira de Almeida translation, the Portuguese version used in the Church, was complete by 1711, but only published in 1748). Theoretically, the Church could take these translations, add its footnotes and translate the Bible Dictionary and Topical Guide.

Its a big project, but less complex than the original LDS edition in English because most of the footnotes and topical selections have been made already in English. And such an edition makes sense when you realize that the current number of LDS Church members in Spanish-speaking countries exceeds the number of English-speaking Church members on the rolls in 1980, when the LDS edition was released, by at least 35%, or more than 1 million members.

So why hasn’t the Church produced its own editions?

As might be expected, the situation is more complicated than it appears.

For a while I assumed there was some copyright exception that kept these editions in copyright. When I finally got around to looking at the issue a few months ago, the problem became clear. Both the Reina Valera and the Ferreira de Almeida translations have undergone multiple revisions over the years, and these revisions are generally necessary for most LDS Church members to understand the text. It is the revisions that LDS Church members purchase and use.

The most recent versions of the Reina Valera date from 1960 and 1995, and are still covered by copyright. The Ferreira de Almeida translation has undergone revisions by three different groups, resulting in three different versions available, all of which are currently covered by copyright.

On a practical basis, this leaves the Church with just four options:

• License the translation and pay a royalty to the copyright owner. Since the copyright owners in both Spanish and in Portuguese are evangelical bible societies, I wonder if getting a license is even possible. [Financially, the royalty is likely to be less that what these societies are earning from selling their editions to LDS Church members. And they may object to dealing with Mormons regardless of the finances.]
• Use an older, public domain version of these translations. Both the Reina Valera and the Ferreira de Almeida have revisions published in 1909, which are in the public domain in the US, and possibly elsewhere also. Unfortunately, the 1909 versions would likely require significant work to eliminate words that have since become incomprehensible to the average Church member. In addition, the change would mean that members would have to become accustomed to a new edition.
• Continue the current situation, having Church members purchase the bible editions sold by others, in spite of the lack of footnotes, Bible dictionary, etc.
• Publish a stand alone Bible Dictionary and Topical Guide for Church members, and let them use it along side their current bibles.

I suppose it is also possible for the Church to create its own translations of the Bible in these languages, but since a translation can take decades and often requires a team of translators fluent in the Biblical texts, that kind of commitment is probably beyond the Church’s resources.

This situation is also hampered by the real distribution issues that the Church could face. Without a network of LDS stores to serve the market or some other system for distributing Church materials, distribution would have to go through local wards and branches. Priesthood and Relief Society manuals and similar materials already do this, so perhaps it would not be too difficult.

Other than maintaining the status quo, for now, I have no idea what the Church will do. I think, as a publisher in the LDS market, I would probably choose to revise older translations and produce an LDS edition of the Bible that way, were I to decide to publish a bible.

But, and this is one of the real issues facing LDS publishers and authors, it somehow doesn’t seem like its my place to publish the bible independently of the Church. Like publishing doctrinal works, the risk is that you will either get the doctrine wrong, or step on the toes of some general authority.

Regardless, I believe that such an edition could be a significant benefit to Spanish and Portuguese-speaking LDS Church members, as well as for members that speak other languages.

What do you think should happen?