Todd Robert Petersen was born in Moses Lake, Washington

Moses Lake, Washington

Moses Lake is a city in Grant County, Washington, United States. The population was 20,366 as of the 2010 census. Moses Lake is the largest city in Grant County.-Background:...

 on August 17, 1969. He is a fiction writer and an academic currently based at Southern Utah University

Southern Utah University

Southern Utah University, or SUU, is located in Cedar City, Utah. It was founded in 1897 as an extension of the Agricultural College of Utah, by the citizens of Cedar City.During its history, the school has been known as:...

. He and his wife Alisa have two children.

He is one of eleven writers selected by the Utah Arts Council

Utah Arts Council

The Utah Division of Arts & Museums is an agency of the state government of Utah, responsible for the promotion of the arts and Utah museums. It is a division of the Utah Department of Community and Culture...

 to represent the arts in Utah education.

Writing

Petersen's fiction has appeared in many print and online magazines. In 2007, his work was collected into the collection Long After Dark. Petersen's work is highly regarded in the Mormon Arts community where Long Before Dark has been called what "should be the model for LDS literature."

Petersen's fiction and poems have won him several awards, including the AWP Intro Award, the Marilyn Brown Novel Award, Utah Arts Award, and Sunstone Foundation awards.

Peterson was a founding editor of The Sugar Beet, an online Mormon satire zine comparable to The Onion

The Onion

The Onion is an American news satire organization. It is an entertainment newspaper and a website featuring satirical articles reporting on international, national, and local news, in addition to a non-satirical entertainment section known as The A.V. Club...

.

His first novel Rift was released in 2009 by Zarahemla Books. It has been awarded both the Marilyn Brown Award and the Association for Mormon Letters Award for best novel of 2009.

Academics

Petersen received his bachelors at University of Oregon

University of Oregon

-Colleges and schools:The University of Oregon is organized into eight schools and colleges—six professional schools and colleges, an Arts and Sciences College and an Honors College.- School of Architecture and Allied Arts :...

, his masters at Northern Arizona University

Northern Arizona University

Northern Arizona University is a public university located in Flagstaff, Arizona, United States. It is accredited by the North Central Association of Colleges and Schools, and has 39 satellite campuses in the state of Arizona. The university offers both undergraduate and graduate degrees.As of...

 and his doctorate at Oklahoma State University. His masters and doctorate focused on creative writing

Creative writing

Creative writing is considered to be any writing, fiction, poetry, or non-fiction, that goes outside the bounds of normal professional, journalistic, academic, and technical forms of literature. Works which fall into this category include novels, epics, short stories, and poems...

. He received his PhD in 2001 and moved to SUU the same year.

His academic writing focuses on Western, Mormon, and pop culture themes.

External links

• www.toddpetersen.org