I was packing lunches for my kids while Nicole read this one out loud to me from the submissions pile and had so much fun listening. There does seem to be a growing subgenre of weird Mormon stories that play around with history with maybe a dash of the supernatural. Steven Peck and Scott Hales do this a lot. David West's Orrin Porter Rockwell stories. Niklas Hietala's Lit Blitz piece this year is not as light, but still has that kind of weird, almost history, part strange wonder feel. I think Scott did some critical work on this toward the end of his dissertation since it's such a break from 1970s "faithful realism."
I was packing lunches for my kids while Nicole read this one out loud to me from the submissions pile and had so much fun listening.
ReplyDeleteThere does seem to be a growing subgenre of weird Mormon stories that play around with history with maybe a dash of the supernatural. Steven Peck and Scott Hales do this a lot. David West's Orrin Porter Rockwell stories. Niklas Hietala's Lit Blitz piece this year is not as light, but still has that kind of weird, almost history, part strange wonder feel.
I think Scott did some critical work on this toward the end of his dissertation since it's such a break from 1970s "faithful realism."
I loved this one for its lightheartedness. It made me laugh and just seemed like a perfect, bizarre, Mormon story.
ReplyDeleteI also enjoyed it in contrast to most of the rest of the stories this year, which I felt tended toward heavier subjects overall. It was a nice break.