Patricia was born in Petersburg, Virginia, way back when. She lived in northwestern Pennsylvania briefly then by roundabout course found herself in Utah attending BYU, which turned out to be an outstanding experience. At BYU, she completed her M.A. in English. Besides actually managing to graduate, she counts among her worthwhile accomplishments transforming the floundering BYU literary journal Century II into Inscape, which became an award-winning student publication and still survives today. She did post-graduate work at the University of Arizona. She left Arizona to pursue graduate studies in folklore at the University of Oregon but on her way stopped in Provo to earn money. While there, she met Mark at a singles’ ward activity, where he won her heart by demanding the following within half an hour of meeting her: “I can see you have some power with language. What do you plan to do with it?” (How romantic is that?!?) His first courtship gift to her was not a bouquet of flowers but a whole garden of etymologies: the two-volume edition of the OED. A year later they married. They’re parents of three children. In 2005, a longtime dream came true for Patricia when she and Mark moved their family to San Juan County, Utah. At her new home, Patricia enjoys gardening, hiking, encounters with the local wildlife, a long view into Arizona and New Mexico when the sun comes up and a breathtakingly clear, dark-skies window on the Milky Way when the sun goes down.
Patricia writes poetry and essays and has published one novel, The Pictograph Murders. She’s especially interested in literary nature and science writing and its development in the Mormon culture. Other subjects that snag her attention include folklore; narrative theory; rhetoric and language theory; archaeology; community; brain injury; human and animal consciousness; Earth stewardship; human agency; and what it means overall to be human on this planet. She’s been a member of A Motley Vision since September of 2005, at which time William Morris took a big risk and added her to his awesome blog.
You can find all of Patricia’s AMV posts here. You can find more posts here.
AWARDS
2006 Association for Mormon Letters, Award for Criticism, “The Rhetoric of Stealing God.”
2006 Association for Mormon Letters, Honorable Mention Award for Personal Essay, “The Birds of Summer.”
2005 Association for Mormon Letters, Award for Criticism for A Motley Vision, shared with William Morris, Kent Larsen, and Eric Russell.
2005 Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought, “Best of the Year Award” in poetry for a single poem, “The Peach.”
2004 Association for Mormon Letters, Award for the Novel, The Pictograph Murders http://www.signaturebooks.com/pictograph.htm.
2003 Utah Original Writers’ Competition, first place for personal essay, “Plato’s Alcove.”
1999 Utah Original Writers’ Competition, second place for novel, Ghost Lights, published 2004 as The Pictograph Murders (Signature Books).
1995 Utah Original Writers’ Competition, honorable mention for group of ten poems.
1988 University of Arizona Poetry Contest, second place for single poem, “Dead Horse Point.”
1987 BYU Eisteddfod, Crown competition, first place for single poem, “The Pear
Tree.”
198? Utah Wilderness Association Poetry Contest, first place for poem, “The Abajos
After a Storm.”
1982 Mormon Arts Ball Competition, first place for group of poems.
1981 Christian Values in Literature Contest, BYU, second place for essay, “The Vermillion Border.”
1981 Vera Hinkley Mayhew Poetry Contest, BYU, first place for group of poems.
1980 Vera Hinkley Mayhew Poetry Contest, BYU, third place for group of poems.
1980 Mormon Arts Ball Competition, first place for group of poems.
1979 Hart-Larson Poetry Contest, first place for group of poems.
1979 Vera Hinkley Mayhew Poetry Contest, BYU, second place for group of poems.
PUBLICATIONS AND PAPERS
Novels
1. The Pictograph Murders, Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 2004. 385 pages.
Essays
1. “Why Joseph Went to the Woods: Rootstock for L.D.S. Nature Writers,” Association for Mormon Letters, 2008 (unpublished).
2. “Bird in the Hand,” Glyphs III: Poems and Stories of the Colorado Plateau (2007): 133-137.
3. “Flying in a Confined Space,” Dialogue (Spring 2005): 119-129.
4. “Questing I, Altogether Other, or Both?: Three Poems and a Prose Bit on Nature,” Annual of the Association for Mormon Letters, 2004: Provo, UT: Association for Mormon Letters, 2004, 167-71.
5. “Poet in Search of a Longer Narrative Form,” Irreantum 4.2 (Summer 2002): 78-80.
Poems
1. “Glaucus,” Dialogue (Fall 2008):
2. “Desert Sunflower,” Glyphs III: Poems and Stories of the Colorado Plateau (Moab Poets and Writers Inc. Regional Anthology: 2007): 132.
3. “Confessions of an Eternal Progression Junkie,” Popcorn Popping, 2006.
4. “The Orchid Grower,” Dialogue (Winter 2005): 201.
5. “The Peach,” Dialogue (Fall 2005): 178.
6. “Desert Gramarye,” Irreantum (Summer 2003): 20-21.
7. “The Foolish Pilgrims,” Irreantum 4.2 (Summer 2002): 80.
8. “It Doesn’t Take a Rocket Scientist,” Irreantum 4.2 (Summer 2002): 80.
9. “Canyon Cliff Swallows,” Irreantum 3.4 (Winter 2002): 45.
10. “Medicine Child,” Mothering Magazine (September-October 2000): 71.
11. Three poems, “Open Range, Wyoming,” “The Servant Girl,” and “Horseshoe
Canyon: The Wall Paintings,” in Harvest: Contemporary Mormon Poems. Ed.
Eugene England and Dennis Clark. Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 1989. 221-
224.
12. “Seventh River,” Inscape (Winter 1985): 23.
13. “Three Related Stanzas,” Inscape (Winter 1985): 34.
14. “Concerning the Revelations of Heaven and Earth,” Sunstone 7.5 (September-
October 1982): 55.
15. “Fables,” Inscape (Winter 1982): 46-47.
16. “Judah,” BYU Studies (Winter 1982): 106-107.
Also included in:
Mormon Literature and Creative Arts Database
75 Significant Mormon Poets, Mormon Literature Database (2003).
A Motley Vision 