Marilyn Brown

Marilyn McMeen Brown was born in 1938 into a Denver, Colorado family about to transfer to Bremerton, Washington, where Pearl Harbor soon raged. Black paper lined the windows, and massive balloons anchored by thick cables waved like giant flowers over the Navy yard to protect ships and men. She recorded the drama of this WWII history in her novel, House on the Sound, contrasting war with her parents’ LDS conversion and baptism in the Puget Sound.

When the McMeens moved to Provo, Utah, in 1945, leaving their father to wrap up his Navy yard assignments, the family faced difficulties reminiscent of the pioneers. In Road to Covered Bridge. Marilyn wrote this history that became the first prize-winning novel of the Utah State Fine Arts Council in 1991.

Loving school, Marilyn earned both BYU’s B.A. and M.A. in English language and literature, and was honored with the first Mayhew writing prize ever given (1962). Her MFA came from the U. of U. in 1992.

In 1964 she married talented musician Lloyd Miller, and won her greatest prize—her daughter Simeen, now in her 50s, who gives back love uncompromised. Because Miller’s talent was overwhelming, a divorce threw Marilyn into nine years of single motherhood. In 1975 she was lucky to find real estate broker Bill Brown along with his five children. (Now sixteen grandchildren and twelve greats!) Bill furnished space and time for her to write, and she produced The Earthkeepers, 1979, Provo’s history, earning the first place award in the AML novel competition. The large volume was later divided at Covenant Communications into Thorns of the Sun, 1992, and Shadows of Angels, 1993. A sequel, Royal House, came in 1994. She also published four poetry and four non-fiction books along the way.

Working for CFI, she produced four Christmas books, and five important novels (see Bibliography). When she met Linda Prince of Walnut Springs Press, she felt a kinship with this excellent editor, and continued to publish five books with her.