The quality of LDS fiction

Found an interesting post by Jeff Savage on the quality of LDS fiction:

I would tend to believe that in general the feeling…was that the quality of novels by most mainstream Mormon authors was substandard, and not worthy of his/her book club. First of all, let me say that this is in no way a new or isolated sentiment. I just came back from a writers conference where another author said in all sincerity, “But Covenant authors aren’t very good are they?” My answer was pretty straightforward. “Some are. Some aren’t.”

I keep thinking that I’m well-read when it comes to Mormon fiction, but you know, I’m pretty sure I’m wrong. :) I’ve barely even scratched the surface. And so I hereby disqualify myself from voicing an opinion on the matter until I’ve read at least 30 LDS authors I haven’t read before. :P

I’m not the most informed on LDS fiction either, but I’ll bet the average work of non-LDS fiction isn’t much better. It seems that - as with anything else in the world, there’s plenty of low quality stuff out there in relation to the high quality. There’s a difference, however, in how most people evaluate LDS fiction; they hold it to a higher standard (which is a good thing in my opinion) and usually don’t even read the low-quality non-LDS fiction. So it’s hard to compare the two.

Are you talking about LDS fiction about LDS people/events (such as the Work and the Glory) or LDS fiction writers (Orson Scott Card, Shannon Hale, Stephanie Meyer)??

I hate to admit that I tend to not like LDS fiction about LDS history (although I have a few, I probably don’t have enough good reasons for it), but DO like a lot of mainstream fiction by LDS authors. Do you see a difference between the two? Perhaps for me it is simply a question of genre and not quality of writing, although I haven’t conscientiously distinguished the two before.

Covenant Books is a bad analogy. Covenant Books have a clause in their contracts saying that they get to publish or have rights to EVERYTHING the author publishes for ten years after a book they publish. They figure they are “protecting” their investments in new authors. Consequently, not many professional or accomplished writers sign with them and I’ve found that a lot of their material is mediocre. Some is, however, good. I find that a lot of Mormon authors are fantastic, but they are published by more mainstream publishers and aren’t as known for being LDS, such as Martine Leavitt, national-book-of-the-year nominee for Young Adult Fiction last year with the book Keturah and Lord Death.

I’m going to have to disagree with David — Covenant has put out a lot of good authors, just as they have put out a lot of bad. There’s variety to be had from every publisher. I don’t think there’s one publisher currently putting books out that I could say, “They’re 100% bad” or “They’re 100% good.” Every publisher has a variety. The way to find the good books is to try them.

LDS fiction is on the rise and the overall quality is getting better. There is still a lot of tripe, but overall, the cream is rising to the top.

Okay, I’m amending my statement — David did say that some of the books Covenant produces are good. So I don’t disagree with him as much as I previously thought I did. :)

Thanks, Tristi. My wording was a little sub-par as I wrote that. To better explain my reasoning, many LDS writers choose to publish with other publishers due to the restrictions imposed by Covenant. The company does sign with a good author at times, but not as frequently as other publishers.

I am no expert. I have been to several LDS Storymakers annual writer’s workshops. Hi Tristi! I see great things happening. For the most part I see that this is a budding area. Authoring books takes time and for so long the LDS market was quite small and would not likely attract many serious writers. It just could not fiscally support such. It takes a market to drive competition and competition increase efforts toward improvements.

What I see when I go to the writer’s conferences is a real drive to improve the craft. Though each of us may have at least one book in us, we are not all at the same level of craft. As skills increase, the ability to get that book into a form, that will transform the reader, will increase, as well. I am both hopeful and optimistic. We shall yet have our Miltons and Shakespeares.

Right now, I see younger audiences are where its at, as they are more inclined to have loyalty, whether they have taste or not. The older audiences like to think of themselves as more sophisticated.
Many of them may have encountered LDS fiction in its infancy and wrote it off then. Some of those early writers have improved their craft, others did not take the effort to educate the taste of their readers, or improve their craft. Some of those developed a loyalty of readers over the years. it is easier to promote a known. So, the challenges within the industry are probably self feeding.

I am encouraged by what I see within the industry to try and leven the lump. I have not given up on this yet.

Like I said, I’m going to read more LDS fiction before I spout off, and to that end I’ve checked out Maurine Whipple’s The Giant Joshua and Virginia Sorensen’s A Little Lower Than the Angels, along with Jeffrey S. Savage’s Cutting Edge. I’m very tempted to respond to y’all’s comments — you have no idea — but I think it’s best for me to refrain till I’ve read enough of the field to know what I’m talking about. :)

Fair enough. I enjoy quite a lot of LDS fiction. I need to read the land of Foo novels that people are talking about but I haven’t had the nerve or ambition to try the Twilight series yet. Maybe I’ll actually read Charly. It’s somewhat of a classic.

I haven’t read the Foo novels yet either, but they’re on my list. Ditto for Twilight (which I’ve mentioned before :)). But I have read Charly, and while it’s sappy and sentimental and the prose is clunky, I still liked it. Which reminds me of something C.S. Lewis said about both David Lindsay (who wrote A Voyage to Arcturus) and George MacDonald (who wrote Phantastes and a bunch of other mythopoeic fantasy tales) — their style wasn’t all that great, but they managed to get the experience of their stories across in a way that captivated Lewis in spite of their stylistics blemishes. Sometimes I’m willing to overlook surface flaws if the story itself is good — the underlying skeleton, the pulsating heart of it. And saccharine doesn’t bother me that much, though of course I prefer deeper, better stories. :)

I think you should both read the Twilight books. Overlook the extreme amounts of cliche metaphors… and you might enjoy them. I have boys in my junior and senior high school classes who say they have (or they might be lying through their teeth to impress the girls, I don’t know). Either way, she has definitely made a mark as an LDS writer and, in my opinion, does some great things stylistically. With that said, I am the ONLY English teacher in my district (that I know of) who does love them. I can’t, whatever anyone says, keep them on my shelves.

Carly, I think you stumbled across my blog right after The Plumed Vampire. :)