Have to comment halfway before I forget :P First of all, what a *stellar* job you've done with the Mormonism (do you have a Mormon background? Or is this all researched?). There were 2 things that jarred a little to me: the congregation/families/etc not questioning or reporting or anything his being without his companion, but that was nothing big. The only one that really threw me was this:
Brendon has accepted that he’ll never stop thinking about boys like he does. He’s never told anyone, and he never will. But he knows as long as he doesn’t act on these feelings, he’s alright.
I'm being nitpicky as all fuck here :P, 'cause I wouldn't even notice at all except that you've obviously put in the effort to get the detail right, and because the rest was so good this kind of really threw his characterisation for me when everything else made so much sense. For Brendon to be not just aware of but totally down with the compromise position without having ever spoken to a bishop or counselor...to me it seems kind of a stretch, like reading that immediately made me ask - where did he get 'thoughts are okay if I don't act' if he never confessed or sought advice? To me it would have made a lot more sense if he'd confessed to his bishop years ago, gotten the standard spiel and pretended it had passed to avoid trouble, and was living on the 'I'll be okay if I act like I'm meant to' from that. But again, I'm just being really really picky 'cause everything else here is awesome :P
So, serious props. Nicely done. Other than that, I'm believing every word of this. All the AU turning point moments, Ryan mentioning 'that Mormon kid', the email from Pete, just give me shivers. And your take on Brendon, the emptiness and the longing for faith, the insecurity about his testimonial, the depression, the meds, everything, is beautiful. This first half made me cry like five times or something :) Really, really awesome fic.
Hey, thanks for the comment. I myself am not a Mormon, nor do I have that background. However I have many close friends who are/were Mormons, and my girlfriend of six years was a Mormon when we met, so I have a lot of experience with it. Most of this comes from conversations I've had with them, or the problems my girlfriend had, when we first got together.
To answer your concerns, my girlfriend and a couple Mormon friends went over this before I posted, to make sure I hadn't missed anything. Regarding the missionaries lacking companions, that isn't entirely unheard of/all that unusual in some of the Eastern states. For example, one of my close friend's grandfather is a bishop, so he often referred travelling missionaries to my friend's house. Most of those groups didn't follow the rules too stringently (some of them are actually the models for Brendon's companions). Also it wasn't unusual for them to eat separately from one another, so as not to tax the resources of the families with whom they dined. It wasn't an issue any of my Mormon-betas had, which isn't to say that it isn't an issue, but maybe it depends from place to place, and on the people encountered.
The homosexuality thing...It's something I've discussed with my girlfriend at length. She never spoke to anyone in the church about it. That part of Brendon's religious angst in particular was influenced by our relationship with each other, and what she went through.
I don't want to seem at all like I'm discrediting your concerns, because I'm working based on my experiences and those of my friends, and I doubt that they're particularly standard examples of Mormons/the Mormon faith. But I feel to change it at this point would be unnecessary, and go a ways to discredit the experiences of those who have helped me in writing it.
Does that make sense? I hope I'm not coming across as bitchy, because I totally appreciate where you're coming from. It also means a lot to me that in spite of these problems you enjoyed the rest of this. Thank you so much for taking the time to even address this. I'm not sure if I'll ever write Mormon Brendon again, but I never tell the same story twice. If I take it on again, I'll be certain to take this different perspective. Thank you! :D
Oh yeah, for sure, no I'm actually really interested if there's a real life viewpoint coming through here :) Prying horribly, so feel free to ignore me :P, but I'd be really interested to know where your friends or girlfriend got the 'thoughts aren't damning if you abstain' position without confessing. Was that something that was taught as standard in her ward? Something from the internet? Again, please ignore me if that's too private a question, it's just (probably obviously :P) an area of interest to me :)
(cool info on lax missionaries, I don't know much about eastern states Mormonism. That's really interesting.)
You know, I'm not one-hundred percent sure where she got that information. We talk a lot about what the church taught, but I don't know if I've ever explicitly asked where it was learned. I'll ask her about it tonight. If I had to guess, I'd say it was something that was sort of general knowledge in her congregation. For example, we're both good friends with a Mormon family from her church. The father, Brother Joe, is the one we're closest with. He's in his early 50s with four adopted children, one of whom he suspects is gay. Now obviously, since he's friends with us, the gay thing doesn't bother him. In fact, he's one of the most permissive Mormons I've ever met, and he and Muse regularly talk about what will happen if/when his son decides to come out. That's where a lot of my information has come from, besides what Muse told me originally.
Most of my Mormon friends grew up in Maryland, Ohio, New York, Virginia and West Virginia, though I do have a few from Utah. Missionaries, of course, tend to be from all over the place, though the ones my friend hosted tended to be from close by states.
Brendon has accepted that he’ll never stop thinking about boys like he does. He’s never told anyone, and he never will. But he knows as long as he doesn’t act on these feelings, he’s alright.
I'm being nitpicky as all fuck here :P, 'cause I wouldn't even notice at all except that you've obviously put in the effort to get the detail right, and because the rest was so good this kind of really threw his characterisation for me when everything else made so much sense. For Brendon to be not just aware of but totally down with the compromise position without having ever spoken to a bishop or counselor...to me it seems kind of a stretch, like reading that immediately made me ask - where did he get 'thoughts are okay if I don't act' if he never confessed or sought advice? To me it would have made a lot more sense if he'd confessed to his bishop years ago, gotten the standard spiel and pretended it had passed to avoid trouble, and was living on the 'I'll be okay if I act like I'm meant to' from that. But again, I'm just being really really picky 'cause everything else here is awesome :P
So, serious props. Nicely done. Other than that, I'm believing every word of this. All the AU turning point moments, Ryan mentioning 'that Mormon kid', the email from Pete, just give me shivers. And your take on Brendon, the emptiness and the longing for faith, the insecurity about his testimonial, the depression, the meds, everything, is beautiful. This first half made me cry like five times or something :) Really, really awesome fic.
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To answer your concerns, my girlfriend and a couple Mormon friends went over this before I posted, to make sure I hadn't missed anything. Regarding the missionaries lacking companions, that isn't entirely unheard of/all that unusual in some of the Eastern states. For example, one of my close friend's grandfather is a bishop, so he often referred travelling missionaries to my friend's house. Most of those groups didn't follow the rules too stringently (some of them are actually the models for Brendon's companions). Also it wasn't unusual for them to eat separately from one another, so as not to tax the resources of the families with whom they dined.
It wasn't an issue any of my Mormon-betas had, which isn't to say that it isn't an issue, but maybe it depends from place to place, and on the people encountered.
The homosexuality thing...It's something I've discussed with my girlfriend at length. She never spoke to anyone in the church about it. That part of Brendon's religious angst in particular was influenced by our relationship with each other, and what she went through.
I don't want to seem at all like I'm discrediting your concerns, because I'm working based on my experiences and those of my friends, and I doubt that they're particularly standard examples of Mormons/the Mormon faith. But I feel to change it at this point would be unnecessary, and go a ways to discredit the experiences of those who have helped me in writing it.
Does that make sense? I hope I'm not coming across as bitchy, because I totally appreciate where you're coming from. It also means a lot to me that in spite of these problems you enjoyed the rest of this. Thank you so much for taking the time to even address this. I'm not sure if I'll ever write Mormon Brendon again, but I never tell the same story twice. If I take it on again, I'll be certain to take this different perspective. Thank you! :D
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(cool info on lax missionaries, I don't know much about eastern states Mormonism. That's really interesting.)
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If I had to guess, I'd say it was something that was sort of general knowledge in her congregation. For example, we're both good friends with a Mormon family from her church. The father, Brother Joe, is the one we're closest with. He's in his early 50s with four adopted children, one of whom he suspects is gay. Now obviously, since he's friends with us, the gay thing doesn't bother him. In fact, he's one of the most permissive Mormons I've ever met, and he and Muse regularly talk about what will happen if/when his son decides to come out. That's where a lot of my information has come from, besides what Muse told me originally.
Most of my Mormon friends grew up in Maryland, Ohio, New York, Virginia and West Virginia, though I do have a few from Utah. Missionaries, of course, tend to be from all over the place, though the ones my friend hosted tended to be from close by states.
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