Jonathan Langford's Blog, page 9

St. Paul Pioneer Press Notice

So I have one more short but positive review to add to the list. This one appeared in last Friday's St. Paul Pioneer Press, in a book column titled "Worthwhile midsummer fiction from Midwest writers." You can follow the link to the article by clicking here, but there's no real need to bother since I've reproduced the two paragraphs about No Going Back below:

"No Going Back" by Jonathan Langford (Zarahemla Books, $16.95): "I wanted to write a story that reflected the dilemma of someone whose e...

Fun at King's English

So I did my appearance at King's English bookstore in Salt Lake City as part of their Local Author Showcase. And it was a lot of fun.

The event (an awfully grand title for a pretty simple thing, but there it is) was held outside, in a patio-type-area (fortunately shaded). We four authors sat at a table in front, with chairs set up for our listeners. (One of the five originally scheduled authors didn't make it.) There were about 20 people there I'd say (not counting the authors), of whom about ...

No Going Back — Young Adult Novel?

A somewhat different version of this column, oriented more toward broader questions related to the YA literature genre in the Mormon market, is posted at A Motley Vision website under the title "Some Definitional Thoughts About YA (Mormon) Fiction."

Who's the intended audience of No Going Back? In particular, does No Going Back fit the definition of a young adult (YA) novel? That's proved to be a tricky question.

First, a point of definitions. As I'm sure most of you know, "young adult" novels ...

King's English Local Author Showcase July 13

So guess what? I'm scheduled to appear at King's English bookstore in Salt Lake City at 6:30 p.m. on Tuesday, July 13, as part of a Local Author Showcase. The way I understand it, four other authors and I will each read for up to five minutes from our books, answer questions, and sign book copies. Woo-hoo! My first reading/book signing! For more details, read here.

I don't honestly see this as bringing in a lot of sales. From talking to people who have been there before, I'm guessing there...

The Writing Rookie #12: Realism and Artistic Convention

Here's a somewhat belated addition to my series based on insights from writing my first novel, No Going Back. For the complete list of columns in this series, click here.

Cross-posted from A Motley Vision website.

If art is, in part at least, the imitation of reality, it's an imitation that's largely bounded by and grounded in artistic convention. That's something I've long been aware of from a literary/critical perspective, but writing a novel myself — and then seeing the reaction of...

Reaching Out

A year and a half ago, I wrote the following as part of my Writing Rookie series at A Motley Vision website:

I'm a socially motivated person. I like spending time with people, talking to people (face-to-face or at a distance), getting to know people. Part of what I've always liked about literature is the feeling of truly getting to know the people I'm reading about. Characters are my friends.

Writing stories, I find, is the same kind of activity—taken to another octave of intensity. The...

ALA GLBTRT Review of No Going Back

Every couple of days, I google "Jonathan Langford No Going Back" just to see what's out there. It's kind of a game to see if I can locate something that Google Alert hasn't already told Chris Bigelow (my publisher) about. Usually I don't find anything. But today there was a link to a review in the Spring 2010 GLBTRT Newsletter, a publication of the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgendered Round Table of the American Library Association. Here's what it said:

Mormon YA literature has come a long...

Proselyting for Mormon Literature

Cross-posted at A Motley Vision website.

I was over at Amazon.com the other day, trying to figure out someplace to post about my book in the Mormon community. I mean, I was able to find a couple of places to post in the Gay etc. community. Surely there ought to be a place to post in the Mormon community

Except, not. Oh, sure, there's a lot of activity over there, but it all really seems to amount to people screaming at each other about whether LDS doctrines and practices are justified. Which...