DiaBLOGue

Quiet Stories, Complex Emotion

Darin Cozzens. The Last Blessing of J. Guyman LeGrand and Other Stories. Provo: Zarahemla Books, 2016. 202 pp. Paper: $14.95.
Reviewed by Braden Hepner

Past Second Base

Joey Franklin. My Wife Wants You to Know I’m Happily Married. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2015. 194 pp. Paper: $19.95. ISBN: 978-0-8032-7844-8.
Reviewed by Eric Freeze
At the last Association of Writers & Writing Programs conference, a famed historical literary figure stood for pictures and selfies next to booths piled high with books. He was bald except for a tuft of hair in the middle of his head and a dark goatee and handlebar mustache. In a more mainstream context, people would probably think he was Shakespeare with his brocade doublet and puffy sleeves. But most images of Shakespeare emphasize his shoulder-length bob. And Shakespeare wore a stiff collar, not a pleated ruff. Maybe the actor just didn’t have the hair? And why the goatee? But anyone who has studied the history of the essay knew immediately when they saw him: it was Michel de Montaigne.

The Latter Days: A Memoir. By Judith Freeman. Pantheon, 2016. 336 pages.
Reviewed by Darin Stewart
Judith Freeman’s The Latter Days is a remarkable memoir of an unremarkable life. The American novelist ticks all of the standard boxes when recounting her childhood – abusive father, distant mother, disowned sibling, youthful indiscretion – none falling outside a common coming of age narrative. She accomplishes nothing particularly noteworthy and does nothing particularly dreadful. What makes the memoir fascinating is the context in which these non-events occur. Freeman grew up in a small, uniformly Mormon town in 1950s Utah. That backdrop elevates her beautifully written narrative from mildly diverting memoir to insightful social and religious commentary.

Reviewed by Julie J. Nichols for the Association for Mormon Letters
A surprising number of newly published works of LDS fiction are by middle-aged to oldish authors who’ve been lurking, apparently growing in wisdom and wherewithal, for decades–Karen Rosenbaum. Me. And now Scott Bronson.
Scott’s been doing theater in many places for many years. You can Google him and find his filmography as well as his bio, so much so that when Margaret Blair Young was charged with putting together a panel of Mormon artists last month to celebrate Dialogue’s Diamond Jubilee, she recruited Scott and Tom Rogers and Sterling Van Wagenen, all big theater names, and then me, not such a big name, but local and newly published and therefore perhaps a good token female novelist to set off all those dramaturgs. Tom stepped up on his own and gathered in Eric Samuelson (beloved retired dramatist from BYU) and Brian Kershisnik (beloved artist), thinking, I guess, and probably rightly, that the panel would be better rounded out if they were included. He gave us all copies of his recently published collection of essays, and Scott had come prepared with his new book too.

A Cluttering of Symbol and Metaphor
David G. Pace. Dream House on Golan Drive. Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 2015. 300 pp. Paperback: $24.95.
Reviewed by Eric W. Jepson
How to represent lived religious experience without either underplaying its reality or slipping into the magical-fantastical is an ongoing difficulty in Mormon literature. David G. Pace, in his novel Dream House on Golan Drive, has decided to lean hard into that latter option. The story is narrated by Zedekiah, one of the Three Nephites assigned to watch over young Riley Hartley. What makes Riley special enough to deserve this honor is never clear. Also unclear is just how much of an “honor” it is to have Zedekiah acting as, essentially, his guardian angel.