In truth, there are as many factions to libertarianism as there are people who identify as such. Get ten libertarians in a room and you’ll get 11 opinions that span not only a spectrum across an idealogy, but span the spectra of idealogies.

There is one thing that unites us, however, and that is the belief in choice. Sometimes, as in the case of abortion, whose choice is up for debate, but in the end, libertarians want to be able to choose how they live their lives without having their homes raided by overzealous religious bigots in the form of Child Protective Services, without having their businesses regulated to such an extent that they are hamstrung, without having their earnings stolen straight out of their paychecks.

In Abraham 4:1, a plan was presented and a son of God said, “Behold, here am I, send me, I will be they son, and I will redeem all mankind, that one soul shall not be lost, and surely I will do it; wherefore give me thine honor.” Then Christ offered his plan and the glory to the Father. The Father goes on to tell Abraham in verse 3, “Wherefore, because that Satan rebelled against me, and sought to destroy the agency of man, which I, the Lord God, had given him, and also, that I should give unto him mine own power; by the power of mine Only Begotten, I caused that he should be cast down.”

This concept is our gospel. It’s the fulcrum of what we as Latter-day Saints believe and why. Without this, we’d be just another protestant religion albeit with some seriously weird kinks.

I made the point over at Feminist Mormon Housewives that compulsory taxation for the purpose of giving it to other individuals in our society was antithesis to the gospel, the gospel of agency, which is to say, the ability to choose between good and evil. In return, it was brought to my attention that the actual point was not that Lucifer had proposed this plan, but that he wanted the glory. Yet God makes it very clear that Satan’s greater sin was that he “sought to destroy the agency of man.”

Our Creator’s goal is to bring all of us home again…with caveat: That we actually learn something.

And there’s the sticky wicket. One cannot learn the principle of anything by compulsion. One doesn’t learn generosity by having money taken from his paycheck arbitrarily and given to someone else, no matter how much the someone else needs it. The choice to be generous on our own, to provide for our weakest with that money, has been stripped from us.

Obviously, libertarians wouldn’t have a problem with some measure of taxation because things do need to be paid for: roads, bridges, fire, police, water treatment, a military. Oh, you know, those things that establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity. There are better ways to collect those funds than via the IRS, but that’s another six posts. However, I will not deny that they are vital to the successful running of a country and everyone needs to share in that cost.

Of course, I know what most of the first jumping off point of this post will be, because it’s used (either disingenuously or ignorantly) as the first point of dissent in the debate: promoting the general welfare, which has been used to justify enormous charitable Congressional expenditures since the New Deal. So let’s get that out of the way right now.

James Madison put this succinctly enough in the third session of Congress in 1794, when an expedition of French refugees had arrived from the Haitian Revolution, and Congress sought $15,000 for their aid. This is the quote from the annals:

“Mr. Madison wished to relieve the sufferers, but was afraid of establishing a dangerous precedent, which might hereafter be perverted to the countenance of purposes very different from those of charity. He acknowledged, for his own part, that he could not undertake to lay his finger on that article in the Federal Constitution which granted a right of Congress of expending, on objects of benevolence, the money of their constituents.”

Furthermore, Mr. Madison said, “The government of the United States is a definite government, confined to specified objects. It is not like the state governments, whose powers are more general. Charity is no part of the legislative duty of the government.” [Italics mine.]

So, yeah, one of the geniuses behind the Constitution didn’t think it was such a good idea.

Whew. Now, with that addressed, I’ll conclude my original point:

If we believe in a gospel of agency, then having our earnings taken from us to be given to someone else is denial of agency. Thus, the redistribution of wealth via compulsory taxation is, by definition of our gospel, evil.

I shall now offer myself up for crucifixion. In fact, please do. I need the publicity.

kthxbai

Perhaps I should admit upfront that I consider myself an undemanding reader. I’ll happily go wherever the author wants to take me as long as it’s logical, consistent, and interesting. Let me add that I don’t even particularly care whether a story is plot-driven or character-driven; give me something to chaw on intellectually and I’m good to go. Make me laugh and I’ll forgive almost anything.

This is one reason why, when I read Stephenie Meyer’s Twilight, I was highly annoyed. I like vampires. I’ve studied vampire myths since I fell in love with Vlad the Impaler somewhere in the early ’90s, so her inconsistent worldbuilding, her habit of telling rather than showing, and her mostly flat characterizations grated.

By contrast, Eugene Woodbury’s take is haunting. Poignant, even.

Rachel Forsythe is an LDS bishop’s wife who is drowning under the weight of the responsibilities tearing at her: a dying daughter and the latent grief of one daughter’s inevitable death, the need to give the other daughter the attention she needs, the burden of carrying on mostly alone while her husband tends to the needs of his congregation, not to mention the regular everyday duties of a mother and wife. Then she gets a new neighbor.

Milada is a vampire temporarily out of her element in a very sunny Salt Lake City to explore an investment opportunity. She lands herself in a cookie-cutter suburban neighborhood in a split-level ranch, surrounded by people she views as a bit odd, but nice. When Milada is invited to a barbecue at the bishop’s house and ends up saving a little boy’s life, her secret starts to unravel.

Once Rachel realizes and accepts what Milada is and understands the unique properties of her dining habits, she must decide how far she would go to save her daughter’s life.

This isn’t a vampire story. It’s a character study of the things we, as Latter-day Saints, might do when pushed into a corner with no apparent way out. It also asks if we have faith in what we say we believe.

The theme of the entire book can be summed up in one line. When Rachel presents her idea to Milada, Milada says: “Christians claim to believe in eternal life. So why are you so afraid of death, Rachel?”

I don’t know if Mr. Woodbury intended for the reader to believe Rachel’s answer, but I didn’t believe her. It doesn’t make any substantive difference, though; the effect would have been the same. At the end of the day, no matter how much faith we have, we do not know what happens to us when we die.

Rachel herself seems somewhat scattered and toward the middle of the book, it seemed I hadn’t heard much more about her dying daughter and I almost forgot she had one. Though that was corrected posthaste, I would have liked to see more distress at her daughter’s situation more consistently, and though I (as a mother) could appreciate that she was probably emotionally numb, I felt the daughter actually didn’t exist for a few chapters. I just don’t feel Rachel’s distress very deeply until she starts connecting Milada’s dots. That said, I do like Rachel and find her sympathetic.

With regard to this vampire’s world, I believed it. Mr. Woodbury gave me a different physiological and anatomical (i.e., plausible) reasons to believe that these creatures exist and how. Mr. Woodbury doesn’t shy away from the innate vampire-sex connection. He does not use the act of biting and drinking as a metaphor for sex, accidentally or otherwise; he makes a clear case that sex is necessary for the vampire to get her nutrients.

Mr. Woodbury also displays a sly humor that abuts worldly sensibilities to Mormon culture and deftly captures the irony. For instance, when Milada checks out the art her interior decorator chose, she muses: “Considering the milieu, Milada would have recommended O’Keeffe.”

I can’t say that the end was a surprise because there were only three logical ways it could have gone and any one of them would have been perfectly workable; two of them would have been relatively comfortable. He took the uncomfortable path. What I’d like now is a sequel to explore the fallout of that ending.

Mr. Woodbury does nothing the easy or expected way in this story. There are no Relief Society and Elder’s Quorum platitudes. She doesn’t consult her husband either as priesthood leader of the home or as bishop. Rachel makes a unilateral decision that has no precedent in LDS history or culture or doctrine; she doesn’t know if it’s wrong or right and she clearly doesn’t care, she doesn’t spend a lot of time dithering over the details of what could happen, and she doesn’t even pray about her decision. She acts quickly and on pure instinct, as any vampire ever did. There are a lot of questions in this book and almost no answers—and I liked that.

Moral ambiguity amongst faithful Mormons: More, please.

There were two age demographics: late 30s and up and…their kids. The youngest I saw was sevenish, but if there was anybody there between the ages of mom-and-dad-forced-me-to-come and 30, I didn’t see them.

It was the most sedate audience of a hard-rockin’ concert I’ve ever been to, but then, most all of us were old and fat. No matter. By halfway through the second half I was ready to get laid.

Now, I can write for a Mormon audience. Or I can write for the romance audience. Or I can write for the general fiction audience (whatever that is). Well. I wrote for all three, because that’s what I like.

The Proviso is a romance novel. Actually, it’s three romance novels. It’s erotic (though not technically erotica), political, financial, and religious. I don’t think anything like it has been done, but I haven’t read every book out there, either. So the problem is, where do I market this puppy?

It’s too graphic (in sex and language) for your average Mormon reader. Yeah, you’re not going to find this at Deseret Book.

It’s got too much thinking and religion for your average erotica reader, which is not to say that straight erotica is bad (cause, you know, I’ve got my share); it just doesn’t fit the needs of someone who wants to read erotica.

Its politics are specific and on the fringes of any political spectrum you want to try to define. (Chanson asked me how I’d like to read about unreconstructed Marxists sitting around patting themselves on the back for how brilliant they are, and that was the funniest and most clever zinger I’ve been nailed with in a long time. I love zingers. Just make them brilliant.)

I love romance novels. I cut my teeth on the huge, sweeping, 50-dollar-word purple-prosed romance novels of the late ’70s when I had barely hit puberty. But I want romance in a way I don’t get from either the romance genre (or any of its sub-genres) NOR from Mormon romance (as discussed in a previous post). As far as I’m concerned, Mormons shouldn’t be asexualized just because of this little thing we call the Law of Chastity. In my mind, spirituality and sexuality are two sides of the same coin and neither should be trivialized in the face of the other.

What I had hoped, in writing The Proviso was that I could reach a larger, more secular audience who might not mind reading about Mormons doing wild’n’crazy things if it were smart and well written. When I read characters who are Catholic, I don’t need to be instructed about Hail Marys and rosaries and novenas. I know all that. It’s in the public lexicon. When I read characters who are Jewish, I don’t need to be instructed about Yom Kippur and Sabbat and synagogue. It’s in the public lexicon.

Mormonspeak is not. I want it to be. I want the general public to be able to pick up a book with Mormon characters and automatically understand what “wards” and “stakes” are, what “going to the temple” means (if only in general terms), what Sacrament Meeting is, Relief Society, and the priesthood. Does that mean opening myself (and, by extension, the lot of us) up for ridicule? Yes, but having our traditions, customs, and structures out in the public makes for an easier dialog all around. My Catholic friends can whine at me all they want about being a “lapsed” Catholic and I completely understand what that means; it’s a commonality of language that is so natural to us as a society we don’t even think about it.

By contrast, I’m not out to write the Great Mormon Novel, either. It might happen, but it’ll be entirely unintentional on my part. I write romance. I’m not Tom Wolfe. I’m not Umberto Eco. I’m not Neal Stephenson. But I sure as hell would like to be.

But for right now, I’m writing in a niche market. Possibly a niche market of three, which is me, myself, and I. So my latest work-in-progress is, naturally, a romance, but it’s more specifically Mormon than The Proviso.

What would do you think would happen if a widowed Mormon bishop meets up with an ex-prostitute?

HOW did I miss this? A blog on Mormon sexuality.

Yeah, so I’m not really all about the bisexual historical romance (“a man in love with his wife and his boyfriend”), but what I am about is when self-publishing serves its purpose, which is to say, it gained an audience and a traditional NY publisher’s attention.

Woman’s got guts and somehow got the attention of people who usually don’t review print-on-demand. Again, it’s something I’ve been seeing for a while now, that POD/self (not necessarily to be confused with vanity/subsidy) is gaining more credibility as the writing community decides to believe in its product and go forth alone. I think as more quality work comes out from the fringes of Traditional Publishing, more of the reading public will begin to pay attention.

As for having been picked up by a traditional NY publisher, I’m not sure I’d'a gone that route once I’d gone through all the trouble to self-pub, but there’s no doubt she’ll get a wider audience for her story and that is, after all, what most writers are after.

What I’m also about are the niche markets that are underserved. Once I heard a story about a taste tester for a fast-food chain and that its choice of BBQ sauce was based on what was least offensive to the most people. Whell. Look on any grocery store shelf and you’ll see that any numbers of taste/heat levels are offered; it’s just a matter of the customer finding which one he likes. On the other hand, if the customer doesn’t like any of them, he’ll just have to go make his own.

Oh, hey, kinda like Joseph Smith, right?

(Speaking of reviews of POD books, I read Mrs. Giggles’ reviews [particularly since her reading taste and mine seem to overlap a bit] and just for fun, did a survey of her average scores of traditionally published books, ebooks from small epresses, and self-published/POD. I included the most current 14 books in each category. Traditionally published books scored an average of 67.5/100, ebooks from mostly Samhain scored an average of 76/100, and self-published/POD scored an average of 71.4/100. There’re a whole buncha hypotheses one could draw from the data I looked at, but it’s kinda fun to let the numbers roll around in your head for a while.)

Mormon romance novels seduce book buyers

Germane point:

“I realized that there was a big hole in the LDS market for women’s fiction and I felt like I could do better,” [author Anita] Stansfield said. “I couldn’t find anything to read that satisfied me.”

Several years ago Stansfield wrote about a woman recovering from breast cancer. An important part of the book was the woman’s relationship with her husband, which included their relations in the bedroom, Stansfield said.

The novel’s bedroom scene dealt sensitively and obscurely with the topic of sex, referring more to the woman’s feelings than the couple’s activities. And yet Stansfield doesn’t believe those scenes would make it through the editing process today.

“I know I couldn’t write that now. They have cracked down,” she said.

WTF?

I haven’t read Anita Stansfield because I never heard of her. This is easily explained: I’m east of the Rockies and there is a great divide amongst the cultural habitus of Mormons west and east of the Rocky Mountains. But you know, I feel for her.

I don’t know when the idea of sex became anathema to Mormons, but it drives me up a wall. We’re fairly notorious for having large families and yet…all those kids musta been brung by the stork, cause you know, nobody had sex once that bedroom door closed. We won’t even go into polygamy (apparently they didn’t have sex, either).

I just…don’t get it. Mormons are human, too. We a) make mistakes, b) have pain and temptation, and c) develop coping mechanisms for said pain and temptation. Culturally, we dance around the subject of sex, and I think that it’s neither appropriate nor helpful.

So, like Stansfield, I couldn’t find anything to read that satisfied me, either, so I wrote it. Oh, I expect it’ll piss a few people off, namely members for daring to juxtapose the church against sex, and nonmembers disappointed I didn’t trash the church.

The Proviso isn’t about Mormons having sex or turning the air blue. It’s about people who live their lives and happen to be Mormons or ex-Mormons steeped in its culture. It is graphic, though. I wish that, as a culture, we could find some happy medium between the two ends of the spectrum of sacred to profane.

I wrote people with a unique set of problems informed by their unique culture. I believe there are more people like me out there who want something more, something different, something less sanitized lest some poor soul be led astray (too late for me, I’m afraid).

Do I think there’s a market for this? Yes, I do.

Where is it? Don’t have a clue.

However, it’s new to me. When I was trying to get published back in the ’90s, self-publishing (then only vanity publishing, really) was not only expensive, but the kiss of death. Now…not so much. With concepts such as ebooks, print-on-demand, and the internet itself, the technology is there to do it quickly, relatively cheaply, and to one’s satisfaction (i.e., artistic control). Filmmakers have been doing this for years as have musicians.

I’ll not go into all the reasons I decided to do this myself, but this post by agent Lori Perkins validated my decision to do so.

I’m all about DIY, free markets, and workaround solutions. No, I won’t have a print run of 175,000. Hell, I won’t even have a print run, period. But I think I have a good product that will never see the light of day unless I take the initiative. My hat’s off to those who’ve gone the traditional route. Either I suck as a writer or I’m too far out in the stratosphere.

And I don’t suck as a writer.