I am old enough to remember Mennonite writing before the development of the kind of Mennonite writing that is the subject of this book. Even though I was far from a young literary critic, what little Mennonite writing I recall from my early years did not exactly capture my attention for very long. Plots of novels or short stories were predictable—children got punished for doing the things we were warned against in Sunday school, where little boys might learn that it was more fun to dry dishes for their mothers than to play baseball with the neighbor boy who lived down the block. I was much more inclined to read books with real plots from the public library than to labor through—as a church obligation—whatever Mennonite literature was handed to me. If latent skepticism about the quality and character of Mennonite writing still remains, Jeff Gundy’s Walker in the Fog should expunge such doubts. Imagine Mennonite writing as an ever-changing, ever-rolling sea. Although it is a complete and connected presence, it still has currents that run in different directions and that at times may cancel each other out or end up in disastrous whirlpools. At times it is calm, with gentle swells. Other times it features boisterous waves with white caps and spray flying. This book is Jeff Gundy’s navigation of this sea. He marvels at its beauty, as he paddles us across its shining swells or sometimes decides just to sit in his canoe and drift where the current wills. Other times, Gundy adds to the sea’s turbulence as his oar sharply cuts the water, or adds vigorous or playful splashes to the flying spray. And throughout the book is a sense that the beautiful sea can turn dangerous, and we see Gundy maneuvering to stay afloat amid the potential peril. It is a beautiful, sensual, humorous and venturesome cruise that anyone interested in Mennonite writing will want to take. Gundy’s chapters show us the sea. Each chapter can stand alone. But almost mystically each of them means more as a part of the larger "sea" that is this book. Although a number of these chapters previously appeared as individual essays, they cohere in this book so that the whole is clearly more than the sum of the parts—as a wave can be studied for its own power, volume and symmetry but is more meaningful when seen as a part of the sea. Gundy says that this book is not a systematic survey of Mennonite writing—and he is of course correct. Nonetheless, this book navigates much of the length and breadth of Mennonite writing and Mennonite writers, and those who stay on board to the end will finish the voyage with a comprehensive sense of the people and the issues and the pleasures of Mennonite writing—and perhaps most of all with a sense of Mennonite writer Jeff Gundy. It has been a pleasure to work with Jeff Gundy in producing this fifth volume of the C. Henry Smith Series. I trust that readers will discover that same pleasure in reading it. Much appreciation is due Steven L. Mullet and Jill Basinger Mullet for their generous support of the C. Henry Smith Series and of this volume. —J. Denny Weaver, Editor Walker in the Fog orders:
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