David Rodeback, Author

This is my first post here in two months. I got a little too busy with work and moonlighting, not to mention with writer things, including beta reading, preparing proposals, ramping up a fun project I'll mention soon, and, really, not enough writing, except a certain speech.

On Saturday I'm in West Valley City at the Pre-Quill conference. In the morning I'm teaching a session called "Writing for Contests." At 5:00 p.m. I'm giving the keynote speech (one of those Writer of the Year things), which I'm calling "This Time Is for Us, and We Are for It: Connecting in the Age of the Counterfeit Soul."

Only those who are there will know how much fun we'll be having, unless the noise travels. But the Utah Cultural Celebration Center is a bit isolated, so . . .

Anyway, they made these nice graphics for (or at least about) me, so I thought I should use them.

Registration is still open for the 7th Annual EMAA Writing Conference, to be held on Saturday, March 14, 2026, at 3688 E. Campus Dr. in Eagle Mountain.

Registration is $50; lunch is included. There's an optional $10 add-on: a boot camp the previous evening at the same location.
The conference has 8 hours of breakout sessions, 31 sessions in all (three of which I'm presenting), plus a lunch keynote. Established and aspiring writers, including teen writers, are welcome.

The Friday evening boot camp models a critique group, with faculty and participants critiquing each other's writing, which is distributed and read in advance. Participants who don't want to be critiqued are welcome to attend and observe.

More information and registration are here:

7th Annual EMAA Writing Conference Get information about the EMAA Writing Conference in Eagle Mountain, Utah in June 2024

A fine, short piece on worldbuilding.

Why your World-Building Doesn't Feel Real Writers make the best liars.

I’m at the Center for the Arts at Kayenta in Ivins, Utah, today for Write On Saint George’s Winter Conference. I’m presenting later today, but for now I’m enjoying the people who are presenting this morning.

I very much enjoyed this long interview with writer George Saunders.

It’s slightly marred by the ritual injection of political and economic talking points, but I’m used to that, it’s relatively minor here, and the rest of it is excellent.



George Saunders Is No Saint (Despite What You May Have Heard) | The Interview When George Saunders was awarded a medal by the National Book Foundation last year, he was introduced as “the ultimate teacher of kindness and of craft.” He ...

A reader of my Christmas collection e-mailed me today, said my stories reminded him of a story he read years ago by Ron Carlson, who happens to be a Utah native. I'm especially flattered, because I happen to love Ron Carlson's fiction. If you decide you want to love it too, I recommend a collection called *A Kind of Flying.* Amazon can help you with that, or, better yet, Powell's Books.

He sent me a link, which I'm pasting here, so you can read the "The H Street Sledding Record" too.

I dare you not to love it.

The H Street Sledding Record | The Saturday Evening Post For a truly magical Christmas, you just need snow, a Flexible Flyer, 
and a few shovelfuls of genuine reindeer droppings.

One of my 2025 goals was to read 52 short stories by Anton Chekhov, the world grandmaster of the genre. That's one per week, mostly on Sunday evenings. A long time ago, I read a lot of Chekhov in Russian, but these were in English translation. Anyway, I read the 52nd one Sunday. It was a fun way to spend parts of 52 Sundays.

More consequentially, my major 2025 writing goal was finally to get the novel published that I've been working on, off and on, for years. I was hoping for October, but some other (good) things got in the way. I met some other deadlines at the end of November, and December finally offered some good chunks of time.

I spent about 40 hours (mostly last week) for one last end-to-end revision, then 10 hours (mostly Saturday) for a fruitful proofreading pass. By Sunday evening it was live on Amazon. It'll be available soon in some non-Amazon places too, via IngramSpark.

It's not the Great American Novel, but it's the best novel I've ever written (tee hee), and it's more amiable than a doorstop. It's a long novel for people who like long novels.

Sunday evening, as soon as I could, I ordered one retail copy, so I'll have one while I wait for the author copies (at cost plus shipping) to arrive. I'll have the retail copy tomorrow. The box of books to sell will be three or four weeks. Then there might need to be a little party or something.

Now I'm drafting February's newspaper column, so I can polish it for a while. Then, on January 1, I start a new project I want to have published by June or so, of which more along the way.

Hearts Together Download the free Kindle app and start reading Kindle books instantly on your smartphone, tablet, or computer - no Kindle device required.

I’m at the beautiful Springville Library for Utah Authors Day with about two dozen more authors, some of whom are way more famous than I am, including Charlie N Holmberg and Beth Brower. Come by if you’re in the neighborhood. We’re here from noon to 2 PM. If you’re somewhere else in Utah, there may be an Utah Authors Day event near you. 

There's a BYU football game of some consequence midday Saturday, and there's this. If I weren't at this (with about 24 other authors) I'd be watching the game. If it gets slow at my table, or if anyone happens to say in my hearing, "I wonder how BYU is doing," I may be watching it anyway. We have the technology.

That said, if you prefer books to football (on Saturdays I prefer both), if you're not a BYU fan, if you're already behind on your Christmas shopping, etc., etc., drop by the Springville Library between noon and 2:00 p.m. on Saturday.

Libraries are good for the soul. Books are good for the soul. You have a soul, don't you?

Go, Cougars!

Here's an event link: https://www.springville.org/library/events/utah-authors-day-2/

I’m at the Provo library with more than 90 other local authors from 10 AM until 1 PM today. You should see all the books. 

Tomorrow--which looks to be a gorgeous fall day--the Local Artisans Collective in Ogden is throwing a birthday party. Part of that is a local authors event from 1 to 3 p.m. It's also a Utah Humanities Book Festival event. A bunch of local authors will be there, including me, chatting, selling and signing books, doing readings and Q&A, etc.

The whole party, with other events, runs from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m.

Pro tip: By the time BYU vs. Utah kicks off tomorrow, you could have a good chunk of your Christmas shopping done, just by taking part of a sunny day to visit downtown Ogden. Or you could have some new books to read, including (wink, wink) some Christmas stories. Or both.

And there's always some free stuff at authors events, like colorful bookmarks to use with books already in your reading-them-next stack.

I've been busy accumulating fun things to report here, and I hope to catch up soon, but here's something current.

Tomorrow evening's meeting (October 16) of Celebrate Writers, the Eagle Mountain chapter of the League of Utah Writers, features a presentation by me: "Defamiliarization: Making It Strange."

Here's what it's about, from publicity materials I conjured myself:

Defamiliarization slows reader perception and helps readers to see things differently or see things they’ve learned not to see. It’s what art does inherently, but it’s also a useful tool in our toolbox, and sometimes we can use it to change the world. We'll define it, learn to see and analyze it, and practice doing it in a low-pressure exercise or two.

Here's a presenter bio which is actual nonfiction:

Before arriving in American Fork, where he has lived since 1998, David Rodeback spent about a decade each in Boulder, Colorado (his birthplace); rural southeast Idaho; and upstate New York. He serves on the board of the League of Utah Writers and is the League's 2025 Writer of the Year. His two self-published collections of short fiction won Silver and Bronze Quill awards in 2024 and were named Notable Reads by the 2025 Utah Book Awards. He writes most contemporary, realistic fiction. His first novel, a contemporary coming-of-age story, is scheduled for release later in 2025.

This presentation was well received in Denver a couple of weeks ago, but if you come, listen and participate, and then decide it genuinely sucked, there will be a Q&A period for such questions as, "Seriously? They let YOU be Writer of the Year?"

We meet at 7:30 p.m. at Ryan Hacking's home at 1762 Revere Way in Eagle Mountain. You don't have to be a member of Celebrate Writers or the League of Utah Writers to attend, but you're welcome to ask me why you should join.

Admission is free. A couple of books will be free. Bookmarks and a few of my "STEAM not STEM" buttons will also be free.

(Photo by Dan Chiras)