1 – Reign by Katharine McGee – it’s a teen romance novel that one of my kids got from the library. It’s set in modern times with texting and SUVs, but as if the USA had made George Washington a king and stayed with royalty terms, such as the Duchy of Texas, and GW’s descendants were now the King and Queen of America. That could have been really interesting, but no, it was not – just lots of uber-wealthy and privileged teenagers and young adults drinking and sleeping around, and deciding who would eventually end up with whom in a relationship. And this was book FIVE of a series, the conclusion. This goes on for FIVE books? Ugh. I’m glad I just read the last one.

Why did I read it? Because sometimes I pick up my kids’ books to see what’s out there and what they’re absorbing. Meh – the same “rich people are amazing” fantasy stuff I read as a kid, just with smartphones.

2 – The Patron Saint of Liars by Ann Patchett – set in the 1950s/60s at a Catholic home for unmarried but pregnant young women. Again, I didn’t particularly like it because the protagonist was a mean and selfish person. The whole thing was kind of depressing.

Why did I read it? Because I read online that it’s banned in Florida, thank you to book banning whackheads that are trying to take over the entire US education system, so I got it from the library and read it for sheer spite.

3 – Of Time and Turtles by Sy Montgomery – yay! A book I liked! It’s a memoir of … a person who writes books about animals – I don’t even know what to call her. I don’t think she’s a scientist, but she interacts with people who are, and this time, it was a “turtle hospital” in Massachusetts, either on or near Cape Cod. I also liked it because it made me think of New England. (I like being in the DC area, but I miss New England. It’s both/and.)

Why did I read it? Because I saw it on the New Books display at the library and picked it up on a whim. I started flipping through it and one of the turtle stories got my attention even though I’ve NEVER been interested in turtles. So I checked it out.

I suspect this will be the last book installment of the LLL series, at least for awhile. Richard started his podcast focused on the personal stories of LGBTQ people, expanded it to include other challenges people have in life and religion, kept expanding to include two books on outreach … and announced recently on his podcast that he’s narrowing back down to just LGBTQ support. He really has taken on a lot and it got to be too much. Frankly, I’m surprised he lasted as long as he did before refocusing.

That said, his two books of Improving Latter-day Saint Culture and now this one are really excellent tutorials on How to Be a Better Person and How to Build Zion Now. They both cover a lot of territory but when you drill down, the heart of it all is loving people as they are and accepting them where they are. That’s it. I said a long time ago that his first book, Supporting LGBTQ Latter-day Saints, could be summed up with, “Don’t be a jerk to gay people.” The whole series is – don’t be a jerk. Really. Just be kind to people. Why are you not kind to everyone? Come on, we can do this.

This project was an editing referral from Susan Hinckley, from the At Last She Said It podcast – Russ is her husband. She told me about it when I met her in Utah last May, and he followed up with an email about a month later.

From the first sentence, I was intrigued. “It isn’t clear to me that Jesus was trying to start a church. A movement, yes; a church, no.”

Excuse me? Jesus and NO church?

Well, no, not “no church,” but Jesus was working within the church that was already there, not necessarily trying to start a new one. Teaching an advanced version of faith, most definitely.

And that’s how we got going. We did the editing rounds between June and October 2023. It’s easy to work on a book and do multiple rounds of editing when you support the premise and believe it’s presented in an interesting way. This checked all the boxes for me.

And I’m grateful Russ took a chance on me with the publishing, because that took A LOT longer than we thought it would. He wanted to self-publish. I wanted to learn the tech of how to self-publish but had never done it before. I was upfront that I didn’t know what I was doing but wanted to try, and we ran with it. I used Adobe InDesign, a lot of YouTube tutorials, a lot of texts and emails to various people asking for advice, and a lot of swear words when things didn’t work over and over and over. It took over two months for the production after the manuscript was fully edited, when we thought it would be about two weeks.

But it’s available now! At the link above!

Thank you to:

• Andrew Heiss and Jaida Hancock for scooting me along with InDesign.
• Mindy Sebastian for the cover – both the photography of that cool trail, and the design.
• Ashli Carnicelli and Jeff Andersen for the previews and promotional blurbs on the back.
• Russ Hinckley for the really nice acknowledgement in the book, and his patience while I learned how to MAKE a book, not just edit one.

• Total: 24
• Editing projects: 3
• Fiction: 11 (that’s the most fiction I’ve read in a LONG time). Favorite – The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society.
• Memoir: 4. Favorite – Beehive Girl
• LDS commentary: 3
• Home and life: 2
• Writing: 1

Reading goal for 2024: have a rotation of 1 nonfiction writing or related to a book project, 1 nonfiction memoir or biography, 1 nonfiction religious (which has crossover with work related, but not necessarily), and 1 fiction.

I haven’t started writing about Scouts for the “do a extreme thing” memoir, because well, I haven’t started my own efforts yet to pass off all the requirements (see: adult leadership unnecessary drama). 2024 will give me a lot of material to work with – I’m registered for Wood Badge.

9: I branched out in my writing with some new publications:

• Healing Powers: an Interview with Charlotte Condie, Wayfare Magazine, November 27, 2023
• Can I Speak Aloud About Menopause?, Exponent II blog, April 4, 2023
• Steps into the Dark: an Interview with J. Kirk Richards, Wayfare Magazine, January 6, 2023

8: Marci McPhee and I tackled Listen, Learn & Love: Building the Good Ship Zion with Richard Ostler – the third installment of the LLL series.

7: I’ve heard enough bits and pieces of Marci’s personal history that I wanted more details. So I interviewed her for the LDS Women Project: Go Far, Stay Long, Look Deep. My other favorite interview of the year was with childhood bestie Rebecca Cheney, and now we know why the Tabernacle Choir sounds amazing. Because it’s REALLY HARD to get in! Nearer to the Lord Through Music.

6: I took a flying leap into the unknown of self-publishing production with Russ Hinckley and his book, Beyond Belief. Learning Adobe InDesign for producing a book has been its own version of hell. I’ve learned a lot and I’m glad I did it, but I don’t know that I’ll be ready to try this again soon.

5: A couple of years ago, I interviewed Celeste Mergens for the LDSWP – she’s the founder of Days For Girls, an international nonprofit that provides reusable fabric menstrual supplies and education to women and girls around the world. She recently released her memoir and was in DC for a book tour presentation, and I made sure to be there. So great to meet her and get my book signed!

4: It was the year for meeting people in person … I went to lunch with Charlotte Condie when she was visiting her sister about an hour from me. I broke an internet rule and invited Jeff Andersen and his family to my HOUSE for dinner just based on Instagram conversations, but all is well, he’s not an axe murderer. He is a strong LGBT ally, podcaster, and writer, and his wife is just as awesome. Instagram friends are real friends!

• Charlotte is an artist on Instagram.
• Jeff is a progressive mover and shaker in the LDS Insta-ward.

3: The LDS Women Project had an in-person event in Washington DC, and for the first time in three years of working together, the editorial board was all in the same place at the same time. Liz gave a great presentation on her dissertation about cultural narratives among LDS women and how they affect our perceptions of ourselves and our place in the world.

2: I spoke in church on Mother’s Day about Heavenly Mother – I’ve never heard a talk or lesson about Her in a church setting, ever. I was requested by the Relief Society president, and I’m still curious (although I’ll probably never know) what she said to get this idea past the bishopric. It was interesting to me that the most feedback I got was from men, who thanked me for bringing up this doctrine because they’d never thought about it before.

1: By far, the top thing of 2023 was publishing Cherish, and being with Ashli and McArthur for a 4-day book tour in Utah. More meeting people in person! Lots of them! In Utah, I had breakfast with podcasters Susan Hinckley and Cynthia Winward (At Last She Said It), and dinner with Monica Packer (About Progress). I met lots of contributors to Cherish. But most importantly, I met – after working together for a year and a half – Ashli. We had both spent time with McArthur in 2022 when she did a speaking tour on the East Coast, but it was the first time Ashli and I were together. All the way around, creating the book and talking about it has been one of the pivotal experiences of my life.

I’m reviewing plans for 2024 this week, but it definitely includes more Cherish, more LDSWP, more Scouts, and more writing of my own.

She’s apparently been a major actress for a few decades, winning multiple Tony awards and acting in TV shows. But I don’t watch TV and only recently started paying attention to theater, so the first I heard of her was when she was cast opposite Hugh Jackman in the Broadway revival of “The Music Man.”

So when I came across her book at the library, I picked it up. It was less about crafting and more about her life offstage, particularly her relationship with her mother. That had to have been hard to write – it was very vulnerable and candid, and even though she didn’t trash on her mother, I was kind of glad that her mother didn’t ever see this because she has passed on.

The book had an awful lot of name dropping – actors and singers throughout. But hey, that’s who she’s been associating with since she was 17, so what else is she supposed to do? Those people really are her friends and coworkers.

The name dropping that annoyed me, however, was the restaurants and clubs and other odd locations. “We ate dinner at [location] and then went to …” It added nothing to the story, and was an annoying distraction in a lot of cases. I have no idea what all these places are, so there’s no reason to list the name of the restaurant unless it’s to brag that you ate there. And sometimes, it could have been assumed that she ate dinner before she went to such-and-such event because it was an unnecessary detail – she didn’t need to tell us every time she had a meal.

Overall it was a good book – I would rather give it three stars than four, but there’s no half, so I rounded up.

Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life
by Anne Lamott

The fun part is that this book starts off with “When I teach a writing class,” and she refers to her students throughout the whole thing. So this book kind of IS taking a writing class!

SECTION 1: Writing

• “Good writing is about telling the truth.” Even if you want to write fiction, you can find the fiction in your own memories and experiences.
• Short assignments in a “one-inch picture frame.” When feeling overwhelmed, focus on one memory, one description, one page, one tiny detail.
• First drafts are supposed to be bad. Brain dumping, rambling, all emotion.
• Overcome perfectionism.
• Write your stream of conscious about what you remember of something – a one-inch picture frame about lunch in elementary school was her specific example – and see what you can extract from it for a fiction story. You will be surprised.
• Polaroid development of a story: first of all, what’s a Polaroid? There used to be a type of camera, well before digital, that eased the actual piece of film out of a slot in the camera as soon as you took a picture. It was watery and murky, and gradually settled into focus over a few minutes. Do that with writing – keep going through the watery, murky phase as things gradually come into focus.
• Characters: start with the people – who are they, what are they doing, and why?
• “Plot grows out of character.” Let the people do their thing, rather than trying to box them into a predetermined plot.
• Dialogue: this should also be character driven. Read it aloud for flow and to make sure it makes sense for the character.
• Settings: do your research, get it right. Don’t write about gardening unless you know about gardening, or ask a lot of questions of someone who does.
• False starts are common. Start over, keep going.

SECTION 2: The writing frame of mind

• Make observations. Pay attention to the real world, be a noticer.
• Care, and write about the things you care about.
• Use your intuition. When you don’t know what to do, get quiet and listen to your intuition.
• Figure out how to work around your inner mean dialogue. There will be a voice in the back of your head telling you that you’re a failure. Learn tactics to get around it or to silence it.

SECTION 3: Help along the way

• Take notes. Carry around something to write on and with, and write ideas down as soon as you think of them. This book was published in 1994, well before smartphones made this considerably easier. But the principle is still the same – type into a Notes app, a voice recorder to talk to yourself, take a photo, whatever … just make some kind of note so you don’t forget the idea.
• Call people who know. We have Google now, didn’t when the book was published. But again – I think the advice still holds. Calling someone to discuss something you could find out on the internet is about the interaction as much as about the information.
• Writing groups and writing conferences. In the past two years, we’ve obviously had a substantial increase in online conferences and groups, which is GREAT because it means that networking is even more accessible!
• Get beta readers you trust. Again, “beta reader” wasn’t even a term when this book was written, but that’s what she recommends – a couple of people who you trust to give you an honest assessment of the status of your work.
• Write a letter to one of your kids or a friend – an honest to goodness old fashioned letter – and tell them something that you remember.
• To break writer’s block: write 300 words (or some kind of baseline), then go take a walk.

SECTION 4: Reasons to write

• Write for an audience of one or two, to give it as a gift. Sure, it can still be published for widespread readers, but write for the one.
• Write your truth in your own voice.
• Be a giver, and give your best every day. If you hold back, it won’t work as well.
• Publication: “If what you have in mind is fame and fortune, publication is going to drive you crazy. If you are lucky, you will get a few reviews, some good, some bad, some indifferent.” (p. 214) There is a sense of accomplishment and joy, “but you pay through the nose for this.” (p. 216)

SECTION 5: The last class

“So why does our writing matter, again?” they ask. Because of the spirit, I say. Because of the heart. Writing and reading decrease our sense of isolation. They deepen and widen and expand our sense of life: they feed the soul. When writers make us shake our heads with the exactness of their prose and their truths, and even make us laugh about ourselves or life, our buoyancy is restored. We are given a shot at dancing with, or at least clapping along with, the absurdity of life, instead of being squashed by it over and over again. It’s like singing on a boat during a terrible storm at sea. You can’t stop the raging storm, but singing can change the hearts and spirits of the people who are together on that ship. (p. 237)

Richard Ostler has produced a second Listen, Learn & Love book and it went to the publisher today!

The first one was Listen, Learn & Love: Embracing LGBTQ Latter-day Saints. I was the line editor and proofreader for that manuscript, and it was released in September 2020. The last thing I did on that project was proof the audiobook against the written manuscript.

About two weeks later, Richard emailed me about a second manuscript – Listen, Learn & Love: Improving Latter-day Saint Culture. There are similarities in the style of the two books – his scriptural commentary with submitted personal stories and comments from other contributors. But this one expanded out to cover more topics, such as not judging missionaries if they don’t serve the “traditional” two years away from home, not basing people’s value (including our own) on which leadership positions they do or don’t serve within, not judging people’s clothing or social media posts, and more.

Someone asked what the first book was about, and I said, “In one sentence: don’t be a jerk to gay people.” Now the second book is – “Don’t be a jerk. At all. To Anyone.”

My current church service (yes, in leadership) has focused on BUILDING ZION: developing love and unity within our congregations and communities. Both of these books are how-to manuals on building Zion, and it’s actually kind of sad that they are desperately needed. I personally think that we should be better than these books seem to indicate, but since we’re not, I’m grateful for kind people like Richard to teach us how to do better.

It’s a mix of memoir of her own experience with it, and interviews she did with other people, so there is a variety of perspective. Some people deal with the long-term effects of chemical imbalance in their brains. Some people had a short stint with just a year or two and then were fine. She had chapters on postpartum depression, and the depression of being LGBT in a religious environment that believes just being gay is a sin.

My family has a lot of experience with mental health issues and neuro-divergence, so there really wasn’t anything new for me in the book. But I gave it a high rating on Goodreads anyway, so that other people will read it. It has a lot of good information and stories that will help create empathy.

My personal take-away was a reminder to keep an eye on younger women in my circles of influence when they are pregnant, and to let them know clearly that “postpartum depression” can also happen DURING pregnancy. No one seems to know that – and doctors don’t tell you – until you actually go through it, which I did. I went progressively downhill through my pregnancies until the last one when I just wanted to sleep ALL the time, and ended up with an antidepressant medication just to get through the day. As soon as the baby was born, it was like a switch flipped, and I had my brain back.

• The Well Educated Mind by Susan Wise Bauer
• Deep Work: Rules for Focused Success in a Distracted World by Cal Newport
• Why We Write About Ourselves by Meredith Maran
• The Art of Memoir by Mary Karr
• Scratch: Writers, Money, and the Art of Making a Living by Manjula Martin
• What Editors Do by Peter Ginna
• On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft by Stephen King
• DIY MFA by Gabriela Pereira (do it yourself Master of Fine Arts)
• Big Magic: Creating Living Beyond Fear by Elizabeth Gilbert