In Utah there are LDS themed books in every store. Outside of the Beehive state – not so much. Walk into Walmart in “Happy Valley” and you may be greeted with a display of Gerald N. Lund books. Leave “Zion” and the Brother Lund aisle is replaced with “African American Interests”.

For some reason whenever I enter a bookstore (outside of Utah) such as Borders or Barnes & Noble, before I can look for what I came for, I have to go check out the religion area and see what – if anything – they have on Mormons. Usually, if nothing else, “The Book of Mormon” is there in one form or another and beside it (to balance things out) are often three or four “anti-Mormon” books. I’ve learned over the years that this is pretty much the norm. If you want to find a store that sells books that portray the LDS faith in a positive light you may have to drive half way across the state, make a reservation in advance, and know the secret knock to use on the back door. And even some of those stores, I’ve been disappointed to find also sell “anti-Mormon” literature.

Denver has one LDS bookstore (that anyone knows about) and it happens to be a Deseret Book which if you are from Utah should be familiar to you. I haven’t made it down there yet while it is open. I was told where it was one night as we drove past, but noticed that there was no sign on the street and from my vantage point I couldn’t see it (Maybe you have to go around back and enter through the alley?).

Anyway, I look forward to making the trek down there during business hours and checking it out.

In the mean time I went into Barnes & Noble today and searched for any books on Mormonism. Most of their religion section was overcome by an entire aisle of bibles. It’s good to have the “good book” in a good book store, but this was a little extreme. There were so many versions of it from NIV to KJV, to The Bible for Teen Girls and my favorite The Green Bible, that someone with the admirable desire to read the “The Word” might see this overwhelming chorus of bibles and exclaim some other words in sheer panic.

But anyway, I couldn’t find any LDS books so I asked for help from an employee I found in the large and prominent Gay & Lesbian section. He lead me to the obscure shelf labeled “Latter Day Saints” (I was surprised it didn’t say “Mormons”). At first glance I didn’t recognize any books and wondered if the shelf was somehow labeled wrong, but upon further inspection I realized that most of the books were actually about the FLDS church – the infamous Texas sect and Warren Jeffs. I was troubled by this, as anyone not familiar with the two completely different churches would not be able to distinguish between the “alphabetical by author” books.

The remaining books were not much better. Most of those were “shocking exposes written by former Mormons who escaped and lived to tell about it”. I admit it is hard to get out of the parking lot sometimes after Stake Conference, but I haven’t thought it worthy of a book (I haven’t ruled it out altogether, though).

So anyway, I was very disappointed in the “Latter Day Saint” section at Barnes & Noble. I don’t know why. I shouldn’t have expected much. I just thought that maybe I could get a book or two about my faith that wasn’t spewing venom and hatred toward me. Silly me. Maybe next time I’ll just get The Bible for Tall People instead.