Dead Wood and Rushing Water: Essays on Mormon Faith, Culture, and Family

For over a decade, Boyd Petersen has been an active voice in Mormon studies and thought. In essays that steer a course between apologetics and criticism, striving for the balance of what Eugene England once called the "radical middle," he explores various aspects of Mormon life and culture-from the Dream Mine near Salem, Utah, to the challenges that Latter-day Saints of the millennial generation face today.

Boyd Jay Petersen teaches English and religious studies at Utah Valley University and Brigham Young University. He is the biographer of Hugh Nibley (Hugh Nibley: A Consecrated Life—winner of the Mormon History Association's Best Biography Award), was awarded the adjunct faculty excellence award from UVU in 2006, and completed his PhD in comparative literature at the University of Utah in 2007. He currently serves as the program coordinator for Mormon Studies at UVU, book review editor for the Journal of Mormon History, and is a past president of the Association for Mormon Letters. He and his wife Zina are the parents of four children and make their home in Provo, Utah.