by Scott Hales (bio)
2012 is just around the corner, and if conspiracy theorists and Roland Emmerich have their way, this upcoming New Year's Eve will be our last.
This saddens me a little since New Year’s Eve parties at my parents’ house have always been the highlight of my holiday season. I mean, I’ve never read The Hunger Games, but something tells me that New Year's parties in general just won't be the same against the smoldering backdrop of a newly eradicated, post-apocalyptic world. Especially since I can’t imagine Ryan Seacrest finding a tanning bed so soon after civilization crumples.
With the world ending in a little over a year, the uncreative among us are already planning to spend the next year wearing their lives out doing clichĂ©d Tim McGraw-inspired things: sky-diving, Rocky Mountain climbing, etc. Others will be following Glenn Beck’s advice and hoarding gold and investing in food storage insurance and subterranean Cold War-esque bunkers.
To each his own.
My plans for 2012 are less dramatic. This year has been a great one for Mormon literature, and so much has been published recently that I’ve fallen behind in my reading. So, while others are preparing for the Abomination of Desolations, or partying like its really 1999, I’m going to hit the books and get caught up.
My plans for 2012 are less dramatic. This year has been a great one for Mormon literature, and so much has been published recently that I’ve fallen behind in my reading. So, while others are preparing for the Abomination of Desolations, or partying like its really 1999, I’m going to hit the books and get caught up.
Already I’ve got a head start. Just last month I finished Jana Riess’s memoir Flunking Sainthood, which has been enthusiastically praised and re-praised by Mormon and non-Mormon readers alike. In the book, Riess writes humorously about a year she spent living obscure religious practices—and failing gloriously at each of them. It’s not an overtly Mormon book—Riess, a well-known Mormon author, targets a much broader audience—but its honest message about the paybacks of spiritual failure makes it the kind of book Mormons should read. Especially if they’re getting ready for next year's December Doomsday.
Anyway: click below for a list of other books I’m either reading now or intending to read soon. With any luck I’ll have them all read well before the bombs or meteors or alien death rays start falling.