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Heike's Void
"Peck’s creativity and imagination are the best. He sails into the ozone with words and ideas. The novel is generous with the human condition and the fact that all people have weak knees at times. I very much liked the contrast between the weaknesses of his characters and their surprising strengths. This book is an act of love for the frailties of humankind, for the very deepest meaning of being human. The writing is marvelous, and Peck’s sensitivity to his characters is impressive. I fell “in love” after I read the book and felt like celebrating the frail yet beautiful persistence common to us mortals. This is also a first-class treatise on nothingness and whether or not any God can arise from such."
—Phyllis Barber Author of The Desert Between Us and To the One Mormon Woman’s Search for Spirit
"Only Steve Peck would meld elements from Mormon romance, the Book of Mormon, crime/psychological thrillers, academic prose, and nature writing and wrap them in theological speculation that is both universalist and uniquely Mormon. The result is challenging, heretical (in surprising, wonderful ways), redemptive, propulsive, and full of abundant, profound love and empathy for all living things, especially for us messed up, complicated, sometimes even murderous human beings."
—William Morris co-editor of Monsters & Mormons and author of Dark Watch and other Mormon-American stories
"Wow wow wow! THIS is the kind of Mormon novel I knew somebody had in them."
—Angela Sweat Hallstrom Author of Bound on Earth and editor of Latter-day Fictions
"Heike’s Void gapes open with humility, horror, hurt, and something somehow heartwarming, demanding answers of Mormonism’s most pressing question, a question too infrequently posed in contemporary Mormon literature, the question of Christ’s infinite forgiveness. It does so with onslaughts of ontological argument, tender questions of social justice, the caprices of natural disaster, the tiniest neural complexities, and nose to nose conversations with naughty dogs. These currents come together in what amounts to a page-turner of a harrowing family drama told with the earnest curiosity and fine, earthy detail of Peck’s alternately gentle and devastating prose."
—Jennifer Quist. Author of Sistering, Love Letters of the Angels of Death, and The Apocalypse of Morgan Turner
"Never has The Void been more abundant."
—Michael Hicks, Professor Emeritus of Music, Brigham Young University and author of The Mormon Tabernacle A Biography , Spencer Kimball’s Record Collection , and The Street Legal Version of Mormon’s Book
—Phyllis Barber Author of The Desert Between Us and To the One Mormon Woman’s Search for Spirit
"Only Steve Peck would meld elements from Mormon romance, the Book of Mormon, crime/psychological thrillers, academic prose, and nature writing and wrap them in theological speculation that is both universalist and uniquely Mormon. The result is challenging, heretical (in surprising, wonderful ways), redemptive, propulsive, and full of abundant, profound love and empathy for all living things, especially for us messed up, complicated, sometimes even murderous human beings."
—William Morris co-editor of Monsters & Mormons and author of Dark Watch and other Mormon-American stories
"Wow wow wow! THIS is the kind of Mormon novel I knew somebody had in them."
—Angela Sweat Hallstrom Author of Bound on Earth and editor of Latter-day Fictions
"Heike’s Void gapes open with humility, horror, hurt, and something somehow heartwarming, demanding answers of Mormonism’s most pressing question, a question too infrequently posed in contemporary Mormon literature, the question of Christ’s infinite forgiveness. It does so with onslaughts of ontological argument, tender questions of social justice, the caprices of natural disaster, the tiniest neural complexities, and nose to nose conversations with naughty dogs. These currents come together in what amounts to a page-turner of a harrowing family drama told with the earnest curiosity and fine, earthy detail of Peck’s alternately gentle and devastating prose."
—Jennifer Quist. Author of Sistering, Love Letters of the Angels of Death, and The Apocalypse of Morgan Turner
"Never has The Void been more abundant."
—Michael Hicks, Professor Emeritus of Music, Brigham Young University and author of The Mormon Tabernacle A Biography , Spencer Kimball’s Record Collection , and The Street Legal Version of Mormon’s Book
352 pages, Paperback
Published April 4, 2022
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Displaying 1 - 19 of 19 reviews
July 10, 2022
I am agog at how beautiful and fun to read Heike’s Void is. Steve’s previous work has placed him among Mormonism’s most creative and respected authors, but this is now my favorite Peck novel. He creates an expansive view of the atonement, pushing the limits of the possibilities for forgiveness and healing that we can imagine.
The opening is a little slow, and Heike's the discourses on void are hard to follow. But very quickly I became fascinated by the characters. Jennifer Quist, mentioned that we have been using CS Lewis' stories as literary representations of the atonement for years, maybe it is time to use the stories of Heike, Arrow, Nephi, Alma Lune, Elder Holmberg, etc, as stories told in General Conference and over the pulpit, to explain the atonement. I agree!
There is a lot of tragedy, but also a lot of joy and laughter.
The opening is a little slow, and Heike's the discourses on void are hard to follow. But very quickly I became fascinated by the characters. Jennifer Quist, mentioned that we have been using CS Lewis' stories as literary representations of the atonement for years, maybe it is time to use the stories of Heike, Arrow, Nephi, Alma Lune, Elder Holmberg, etc, as stories told in General Conference and over the pulpit, to explain the atonement. I agree!
There is a lot of tragedy, but also a lot of joy and laughter.
April 11, 2022
Heike's Void is probably best read blind to the details of its plot. Here is a little spoiler-free overview: There are four main living characters:
-a General Authority (whom God hates)
-his secretary
-a Moabite man who spent some time in the army
-a German woman who is really into the esotericism of the void.
Additionally, Nephi is the Moabite's guardian angel. Each main character had layers of ethical dilemmas that were pleasing to behold. There were occasional sentences that made me pause in awe or hilarity, and there were theological questions that I will be chewing on for a while.
When I was a little freshman at BYU in 2005, I remember buying Godel, Escher, Bach with my birthday money. It discussed Godel's incompleteness theorem and the philosophical and mathematical problems of self-reference and sets of sets that don't include themselves in playful conversations between Achilles and a tortoise. Heike's discussions of the void have similar themes, but lean into the mysticism that surrounds the impossibility of describing or thinking about something that doesn't exist. It was fun then and it's still fun now.
However fun it was, I still have a question. What was the purpose of her discussions of the void?
In the end, I'm thinking about Heike a lot, but the other characters had interesting progressions too.
There was one last thing I wanted to mention. I've used my own writing to work through some of my own psychological wrinkles. I think Steven Peck might use writing in the same way. On Snap Judgement, Lori Peck, Steven's wife, spoke about her experience with Steven's brainworm-caused madness. It was understandably a really difficult time for her.
I think everyone should read this book. It isn't as weird or difficult as Gilda Trillum. But it is the good weird that makes a little space for Mormon misfits like myself.
-a General Authority (whom God hates)
-his secretary
-a Moabite man who spent some time in the army
-a German woman who is really into the esotericism of the void.
Additionally, Nephi is the Moabite's guardian angel. Each main character had layers of ethical dilemmas that were pleasing to behold. There were occasional sentences that made me pause in awe or hilarity, and there were theological questions that I will be chewing on for a while.
When I was a little freshman at BYU in 2005, I remember buying Godel, Escher, Bach with my birthday money. It discussed Godel's incompleteness theorem and the philosophical and mathematical problems of self-reference and sets of sets that don't include themselves in playful conversations between Achilles and a tortoise. Heike's discussions of the void have similar themes, but lean into the mysticism that surrounds the impossibility of describing or thinking about something that doesn't exist. It was fun then and it's still fun now.
However fun it was, I still have a question. What was the purpose of her discussions of the void?
In the end, I'm thinking about Heike a lot, but the other characters had interesting progressions too.
There was one last thing I wanted to mention. I've used my own writing to work through some of my own psychological wrinkles. I think Steven Peck might use writing in the same way. On Snap Judgement, Lori Peck, Steven's wife, spoke about her experience with Steven's brainworm-caused madness. It was understandably a really difficult time for her.
I think everyone should read this book. It isn't as weird or difficult as Gilda Trillum. But it is the good weird that makes a little space for Mormon misfits like myself.
April 12, 2022
The twists and turns in this book were so fun. It was a truly Peckian story to the end, which always excites and invigorates. I think that the character Nephi was a little one dimensional, as if the narrative of Nephi being the arrogant, entitled little brother was taken to a logical conclusion without much nuance. I don’t think that this was a Mormon novel, rather I would call it a novel centered around theological speculation of an open/relational/process type that utilizes aspects of LDS culture to prop up a radical reading of Mormon ontology. That’s exactly what makes Peck so interesting. He makes me uncomfortable, but there’s real insight to be gleaned in the midst of discomfort.
May 1, 2022
As usual, Steven Peck has written a provocative, mind-bending, and enlightening story. His skills as a storyteller and deep thinker are unquestionable, and the story of Arrow, Heike/Regine, Alma Lune, Elder Holmberg, and the angels/goddesses who guide and influence them is riveting. This story touches and considers many themes, especially the nature of God/deity, grief/healing, revenge/forgiveness, ground of being (void)/creation, good/evil, judgment/grace, and the state of an individual's soul based on choices and circumstances. A brilliant, thought-provoking read!
April 19, 2022
Heike’s Void is a radical experiment with whether or not salvation is truly infinite and eternal, without limits, or whether it is something else. And if it is something else, then how can any of us hope for it to ever be enough? There is no arithmetic of salvation in this novel, no neat economies or equations, not even any variables or functions with which to express them. There is no bicycle to be paid for with piggy bank pennies. Instead, there are urgent but impossible questions about whether the mercy of God indeed “overpowereth justice,” and if it does, do any of us actually believe it. If God hated someone, would it keep them from his infinite grace? Could their suicide? How about accidental homicide? Planned and deliberate homicide? Mass planned and deliberate homicide then? Is not this endless?
At the heart of the story, adding warmth to its urgency, is in the character of Arrow Beamon, a man with terrible judgment led by his appetites and aversions, making ridiculous miscalculations, noble and ignoble gestures, and yet holding my whole-hearted support every moment he is on the page. When faced with a hard question, he comforts his wife with a pat answer we may have heard before, trivial, a “cringe” answer especially in the context of the exacting reason and thoughtfulness of the rest of the novel. Yet in Arrow’s meek and hapless voice, it is somehow poignant, one of the most subtle ways the novel considers what could possibly contain all the knowledge and power and mercy of a being who is actually God.
The novel addresses contemporary and timeless social and spiritual grievances to Christianity itself, not to some pasty American simulacra of Christianity. Through Peck’s literary artistic experimentation come questions about God and grace for which we have no vocabulary, no syllogisms, only stories.
At the heart of the story, adding warmth to its urgency, is in the character of Arrow Beamon, a man with terrible judgment led by his appetites and aversions, making ridiculous miscalculations, noble and ignoble gestures, and yet holding my whole-hearted support every moment he is on the page. When faced with a hard question, he comforts his wife with a pat answer we may have heard before, trivial, a “cringe” answer especially in the context of the exacting reason and thoughtfulness of the rest of the novel. Yet in Arrow’s meek and hapless voice, it is somehow poignant, one of the most subtle ways the novel considers what could possibly contain all the knowledge and power and mercy of a being who is actually God.
The novel addresses contemporary and timeless social and spiritual grievances to Christianity itself, not to some pasty American simulacra of Christianity. Through Peck’s literary artistic experimentation come questions about God and grace for which we have no vocabulary, no syllogisms, only stories.
March 24, 2023
Oh my goodness, I didn't know Mormon lit could be like this. Heike's Void is a philosophical struggle with the meaning and power of the atonement disguised as a compelling piece of fiction. I was pulled along through every page, worried about what would happen to my favorite characters (and by the end that was all of them). I stayed up past my bedtime several nights trying to finish just one more chapter.
Peck's take on Nephi is perhaps his most profound accomplishment in this book. He manages to completely rewrite our perceptions of Nephi (and the entire Book of Mormon along with it!) while still allowing the scriptures to work as they are. The first time I realized that the now resurrected Nephi was an only angel while Laman's wife was a goddess, I was hesitant, worried that the rewrite would be slanderous of a venerated (though not uncontroversial) prophet, but by the end, the reworking of Nephi's story is life-giving and one of the best sermons on the nature of a prophet as both called of God and flawed human.
And that's the nature of this book: Heike's Void asks uncomfortable questions, setting up situations in which something you thought completely settled becomes obviously wrong. And then he proceeds to provide, not a pat answer, but an exploration of the dimensions of the question that leads inevitably to a clear picture of justice and mercy and who we really are. And it does all this with prose that is both clear and beautiful. I will be recommending this book to people for a long time.
Peck's take on Nephi is perhaps his most profound accomplishment in this book. He manages to completely rewrite our perceptions of Nephi (and the entire Book of Mormon along with it!) while still allowing the scriptures to work as they are. The first time I realized that the now resurrected Nephi was an only angel while Laman's wife was a goddess, I was hesitant, worried that the rewrite would be slanderous of a venerated (though not uncontroversial) prophet, but by the end, the reworking of Nephi's story is life-giving and one of the best sermons on the nature of a prophet as both called of God and flawed human.
And that's the nature of this book: Heike's Void asks uncomfortable questions, setting up situations in which something you thought completely settled becomes obviously wrong. And then he proceeds to provide, not a pat answer, but an exploration of the dimensions of the question that leads inevitably to a clear picture of justice and mercy and who we really are. And it does all this with prose that is both clear and beautiful. I will be recommending this book to people for a long time.
November 10, 2023
3.5 stars rounded up.
I’m still thinking about this one. It’s very hard to describe seriously because there’s so much going on especially if you’re LDS, know the culture and scriptures well enough—it’s interesting, compelling, and I kept wanting to read more.
What I like about the two books I’ve read by Peck: they’re thought provoking. You don’t want to take things at face value and there’s an urge to pry deeper into what we see lying on the surface because that’s never what it’s all about anyway.
I’m not even going to try and explain what this book is about. It’s wild. I had a fun time attempting to explain it to a friend and it went poorly but we had a good laugh about it anyway.
I’m still thinking about this one. It’s very hard to describe seriously because there’s so much going on especially if you’re LDS, know the culture and scriptures well enough—it’s interesting, compelling, and I kept wanting to read more.
What I like about the two books I’ve read by Peck: they’re thought provoking. You don’t want to take things at face value and there’s an urge to pry deeper into what we see lying on the surface because that’s never what it’s all about anyway.
I’m not even going to try and explain what this book is about. It’s wild. I had a fun time attempting to explain it to a friend and it went poorly but we had a good laugh about it anyway.
July 6, 2025
This is intense. I finished reading it while camping, and it invaded my dreams and sleep. I will be thinking about the philosophical questions of the book for a long time.
September 26, 2022
Heike's Void does an incredible amount of theological work within a darkly, absurd premise: that a religiously-motivated serial killer becomes entangled in the life of one of her would-be victims. Assassin and victim draw additionally unlikely pairs into their orbit—a homophobic church leader and his closeted, gay (male) secretary, a long-dead king-turned-ministering-angel and the goddess charged with his redemption—who can neither redeem nor escape the other. Ultimately, their intertwined stories of harm and healing teach us something profound about a God who must hate in order to love.
I love that that this book encourages us to see the assassin buried in the psyche of every Mormon housewife.
I love that that this book encourages us to see the assassin buried in the psyche of every Mormon housewife.
September 17, 2022
I am not sure how he does it to me every time. I read with resistance because I wasn't asked if I agreed to the terms of the world I have just entered, terms that seem to violate my own lived sense of reality but slowly and gradually over the course of reading I finally decide to let my own terms go and allow myself to suspend disbelief, only to find myself in a place of wondrous possibility with own sense of reality profoundly altered, and always for the better. Fiction is by definition speculative and few writers are more speculative than Steve Peck, but fiction's speculations are aimed at a possible reorientation of hope and few are also more hopeful.
January 15, 2024
Weird and fascinating novel centering Mormon characters, angels, and beliefs. (This is not the central plotline, but Nephi is a guardian angel who needs to help one of the main protagonists in order to become a god; Laman is already god-status, Sam was deaf while he was alive, just things like that that make me go, oh yeah I could see that from the Book of Mormon!) Main plotline is a woman who seeks revenge against a man who killed her life love and later endures a personality split. Steven Peck is a faculty member at BYU and writes novels in his spare time. Anyway, a really interesting novel!
September 9, 2022
I really thought I had written a review of this. From the author:
"Heike's Void is like Jack Weyland and David Foster Wallace are in a car crash, and someone sews them back together into a gorgeous Mary Shelleyesque creature, both sentimental and macabre."
I really enjoyed reading this, and it kept me thinking. The author explores quite a few interesting questions about our capacity to experience redemption, suggesting that the atonement is truly infinite and eternal, and there may be hope for us all.
"Heike's Void is like Jack Weyland and David Foster Wallace are in a car crash, and someone sews them back together into a gorgeous Mary Shelleyesque creature, both sentimental and macabre."
I really enjoyed reading this, and it kept me thinking. The author explores quite a few interesting questions about our capacity to experience redemption, suggesting that the atonement is truly infinite and eternal, and there may be hope for us all.
December 8, 2022
The narrative twists and turns as the characters stories intermingle had me exclaiming aloud on multiple occasions.
The story is shockingly riveting, if not occasionally a little dark.
I was moved by Alma Lune's capacity for loving service to the one who God Hates (who nevertheless realises this is unfair and irrational).
At times I skipped over some of Heike's more esoteric philosophical discussions, but they give context to the themes, and something to chew on about the origin(s) of God, gods and goddesses.
The story is shockingly riveting, if not occasionally a little dark.
I was moved by Alma Lune's capacity for loving service to the one who God Hates (who nevertheless realises this is unfair and irrational).
At times I skipped over some of Heike's more esoteric philosophical discussions, but they give context to the themes, and something to chew on about the origin(s) of God, gods and goddesses.
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November 11, 2022Whitney award nominee
October 6, 2023
It's a wonderful story. It made me think. The author's love and knowledge of the natural world shines through. I was frequently distracted by typos and odd dialog, though.
November 17, 2023
What did I just read? That was strange.
August 1, 2022
I've tried describing this book to a number of people, but keep having to throw up my arms and give up.
"Nephi's a what?"
"An elderly latter-day apostle goes on a rafting trip and is medevaced out of the canyon?"
"Laman's wife has a name?"
I then try to explain that the book's messages require deep-thinking. People look at me like I'm a nut. They'll just have to read it themselves.
"Nephi's a what?"
"An elderly latter-day apostle goes on a rafting trip and is medevaced out of the canyon?"
"Laman's wife has a name?"
I then try to explain that the book's messages require deep-thinking. People look at me like I'm a nut. They'll just have to read it themselves.
August 19, 2022
Haven’t read anything quite like this. Touches on revenge, love, homosexuality, the Atonement of Jesus Christ, Nothing, redemption, the nature of God, so many themes that tie together so artistically.
January 3, 2025
Absolutely phenomenal. Steven Peck has outdone himself with this deeply moving and completely engrossing exploration of LDS theology and the meaning of grace and repentance. As always, his novels aren't for the faint of heart (or perhaps the faint of mind), as it takes an unflinching view of the extremes of human experience. But it always remains tasteful in its depiction of evil and ultimately affirms the beauty and catharsis of redemption, though perhaps not redemption as Calvin would recognize it.
Displaying 1 - 19 of 19 reviews