The 2007 AML Writers Conference will be held at the Salt Lake Community College Redwood Campus Student Center on 10 November 2007 and speakers include Robert Kirby (keynote), Dave Wolverton, Tim Slover, Margaret Blair Young, Rick Walton, Jim Bell, Chris Bigelow, as well as a panel discussion between Bruce Jorgensen and Neal Kramer.

Preregistration deadline is 27 October.

A link to the online registration form, a page listing speakers and links to information about them, and directions and parking information for the conference can be found at

http://www.mormonletters.org/events/aml2007wcreg.html

We hope you will join us.

The writers conference deserves a thorough, detailed write-up. I don't have time to do one, so here are some tidbits.

My favorite quote from the entire conference:

Marvin Payne, on how pioneer stories tend to have the same structure: "So when they come together, they are way arc-y."

I really enjoyed Stephen Carter's and Eugene Woodbury's session on structure in fiction. I especially enjoyed Kathleen Dalton-Woodbury's comments which included Orson Scott Card's 4 basic structures. I like the point that we are all participating in the same basic story (leaving the paradisical pre-existence for a journey in the lone and dreary world with the hope of returning triumphant) that makes even non-Mormons resonate with that general structure in a story.

My favorite session was Robert Kirby's plenary address. Here are some quotes:

"What you believe isn't any of my business. HOW you believe puts you in my [writer's] territory. Because that speaks to how you treat other people."

"We are human beings first and Mormons a very, very distant second."

"Great literature is not about 'us' vs. 'them.' It's just about us."

paraphrase: Mark Twain is a good example. You can see his criticism of people, but through it all you see his love for people, for every one of them.

paraphrase: "A fictionalized story that tells an approved story of ourselves is not literature, it's narcissism."

And I loved his story about saying that he could beat up President Hinckley, then including in his apology to President H. the line, "but I know I could beat up the pope."

Bruce Jorgensen's and Neal Kramer's debate was fascinating but much too short.

As usual, the best thing about the conference for me was the conversations I had between sessions.

Thanks to Kathleen and Eric and Cheryl and all those who did huge amounts of work to pull it off, hang up signs, arrange and order things, clean up after, arrange the paperwork, contact speakers, arrange recording, etc.

There are CDs available of each of the individual sessions as well as a CD in mp3 format that contains all of the sessions. Cost for individual sessions was $9.00 at the conference (they were available soon after the end of each session), and the cost for the mp3 CD with all of the sessions is $33.00 postpaid.

We'll get a link up on the AML website for ordering CDs as soon as possible.

One thing I really dislike about being in Michigan is that it precludes me from attending the AML conferences. This year's sounds so great. I sting with regret.

Who attended Stephen and Eugene's manifesto session? I'm very curious to hear what their ideas were about what Mormon literature is missing.

Anyway, please notify us when the link to buy CDs is on the website because I'll definitely purchase some. How is the sound quality, btw? Not to nitpick, but I hope it was recorded well.

Thank you! When will this be made available?

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Upon the stage of a theater can be represented in character, evil and its consequences, good and its happy results and rewards; the weakness and the follies of man, the magnamity of virtue and the greatness of truth. The stage can be made to aid the pulpit in impressing upon the minds of a community an enlightened sense of a virtuous life, also a proper horror of the enormity of sin and a just dread of its consequences. The path of sin with its thorns and pitfalls, its gins and snares can be revealed, and how to shun it (Discourses of Brigham Young, p.243; Bookcraft, 199