Missing Thea James by Author Cathy Elliott

As I celebrate the recent release of my new cozy mystery, A Stitch in Crime, I find myself missing someone. Missing my plucky protagonist, Thea James, even amid much mention of her exploits. Once, her thoughts and movements and loves and concerns filled my head. They kept me company as I wrote recorded her adventures in the daytime and later, when I teetered on the edge of dreams, I’d plan what she might do tomorrow. 

I was so drawn into Thea’s story, often I didn’t notice certain things. Important things. Like the night I rushed into the kitchen, cut up my favorite veggies – broccoli, Brussels sprouts, and cabbage – and arranged them in the steamer. I turned on the heat, covered the pot, and hurried back to my computer. To Thea. She was in the middle of a very bad situation, in need of immediate rescue. No one could help her except me. I had to write her out of that wrong. And be quick about it.

It took about forty-five minutes to move the story past that terrible part, allowing Thea a chance to escape, but I was focused. Determined. Single-minded, if you will. And finally managed to bring Thea through without real harm. Whew. 

I sat back in my chair, happy, relaxed, breathing deep sighs of satisfaction. But wait. What was that smell? Straightening up, I did the head-cock thing. The veggies!

Like a rocket, I zoomed back into the kitchen and turned off the heat. Picking up the pot with the steamer inside, I noticed it seemed extra light. When I took off the lid, I saw why. No water. I’d forgotten to fill the bottom of the pot with water for steaming. And forgotten to set the timer. Thea’s dilemma had consumed my thoughts so much that now I had no dinner to consume.

Turning on the water, I allowed some to accumulate in the bottom of the pot. It sizzled resentfully. Steam rose up through the vegetables, moistening them. Hey, they didn’t look all that bad. I forked through and realized they weren’t burned. True, they had a curious smoked fragrance, but I didn’t see any burned broccoli. Of course, the pot was black as soot. I sent up a “thank You” that I’d used one of my heavy-duty, All-Clad pots that I love so much just for this reason. To accommodate my absent-minded, culinary skills. Especially on deadline.

What a relief. I’d saved Thea and the pots had saved dinner. A little butter, sprinkle of lemon pepper (my new favorite seasoning), a bit o'cheese, and it became a blackened feast. Okay, in truth, only the pot was blackened, but the dish had the hint of the old campfire about it, without the roasted marshmallows. Not bad.

Thea and I had many such side trips. Where her world seemed more real at times than mine. It certainly invaded most everything I did, everywhere I went, and every conversation. At Bible study, I’d admire the quilt on the back of a sofa and think, “I bet that would be a good quilt to put in the Blocks on the Walk Quilt Show.” I’d find out the details and make a note to self. At dinner with friends, someone would tell a funny story about a relative or say something in a way I’d never heard before. “Do you mind if I use that in the book?” I’d ask, writing it down. 

Thea and I had a close relationship for some time and I enjoyed every companionable moment. Not thinking about her is an adjustment. It feels a bit like empty-nest-syndrome. And maybe I’m taking too much time to say “goodbye.” I need to do so pretty soon. Once she is settled in the hearts of new readers, living out her story, maybe then. 

After all, many other characters are waiting, vying for their worlds to be created. For their stories to be told. I think it’s almost time to open the door and welcome them inside. I’ll wave to Thea as she goes and give her a high-five, knowing she’ll be okay.

Cathy Elliott is a full-time writer in northern California whose cozy mysteries reflect her personal interests from quilting and antique collecting to playing her fiddle with friends. She also leads music at church and cherishes time with her grandchildren. Cathy’s other plot-twisting works include Medals in the Attic and A Vase of Mistaken Identity.

Website & Occasional Blog - www.cathyelliottbooks.com

Pinterest - https://www.pinterest.com/cathyelliott10/

Facebook – Author Cathy Elliott cathyelliottbooks.com

Read More

Where Do Ideas Come From? by Author Robin Caroll

I’m often asked how I get ideas for my books. I always want to answer, “Where don’t I get ideas?” 

I get character ideas by people watching. Airports are especially great outlets for this. I watch people. I study them. Yes, even been known to snap a picture of one with my cell phone because of a certain hairstyle, or quirk, or expression. All of this information filters down and finds its way into a character. 

I also get ideas from watching documentaries. For instance, the germ of an idea for my most recent book, Hidden in the Stars, came about because I’d watched a documentary of the successful Russian ballet company. It was in my brain when I flipped channels after it was over and saw the longest news segment of all the Olympic-hype. My mind immediately went to playing the “what if” game... What if I blended ballet and Olympics? What if I made some of the most beautiful ballet costumes integral to solving the crime in the book? And thus, the basic concept for Hidden in the Stars was born.

Ideas are everywhere, you just have to look for them. Now, back to the game. What if a writer was on tight deadline? What if she kept playing on email and the internet instead of making her word count? What if...?

Robin Caroll is the author of 22 published novels. Her books have been named finalists in contests such as the Carol Awards, HOLT Medallion, Daphne du Maurier, RT Reviewer’s Choice Award, Bookseller’s Best and Book of the Year. She gives back to the writing community by serving as conference director for American Christian Fiction Writers.

For more information about Robin Caroll and her books, visit her online home at www.robincaroll.com. She is also active on Facebook and Twitter. 

Read More

A Visit With our Own Sandra Moore

Today we have a treat: one of our own Borrowed Book bloggers, Sandra (who writes as S. Dionne Moore) comes out from behind the curtain to chat with us.

Come on out, Sandra. Oh, look, there she is! We won't applaud, though, in case we embarrass her and she hides again. Instead, let's talk about her latest release, A Heartbeat Away, part of the Quilts of Love series by Abingdon Press.

How did you get connected with the Quilts of Love series?

A private tour through Antietam Battlefield led me to ponder another setting for a historical romance. My agent suggested that I write a proposal for the relatively new Quilts of Love series. I wasn’t so sure about the quilting part, since I don’t sew that well. But one thing I can do is admire the time and effort put into the beautiful pieces of what really amounts to art. Then it came to me. . .maybe my character can’t sew either! I then had to delve into the characterization of the heroine who became Elizabeth in order to make her frustration with sewing become an intricate part of her personality.

What made you take the direction you did with your book’s setting?

After visiting Antietam Battlefield (and eating local Burkholder Bakery’s delicious donuts!), my  mind began churning with ideas that would highlight not the actual battle but the struggles that the people of the town faced as war was brought to their doorstep.

Do you have a favorite character from your book?

Definitely Gerta. If you’re familiar with my books at all, I almost always have one who adds a spark of humor to the story. I love someone with a sense of humor. Couple that with a heavy does of sassiness and it makes, for me, a prime character.

What lesson do you hope readers walk away with after reading your Quilts of Love book?

You’re tougher than you think. War is more than soldiers aiming their guns and blowing up others. It affect the townspeople, the citizens. Young and old, able-bodied or not. No one is unscathed, and yet it sometimes happens that we are called upon to endure such an atrocity. Let us prepare now for what we might one day be forced to embrace as a new reality.

What was your favorite scene to write?

All the scenes at the cabin in the woods that Jim, Joe, and Elizabeth escape to were especially poignant to write. Elizabeth’s confrontation with Gerta is a primary scene for me and one that I had to consider for a long time before actually doing the writing.

Do you have any writing rituals? What are they?

Other than the routine of waking up, eating, working out, then putting in my daily word count of 2500 words, there isn’t anything out of the ordinary that I do when I write.

What’s your favorite quote from the book?

I have a few! One is: “It shows a greater depth of character when someone can look beyond a body’s weakness and see the beauty within.”

The other favorite is a question: “When did your faith stop and the worry take over?”

I love this question. It stops me in my worry-wart tracks and redirects my thoughts toward Him.

  

Anything else your readers should know about your Quilts of Love book?

I have several Pinterest boards. One in particular is devoted to pictures from Antietam Battlefield: http://www.pinterest.com/sdionnemoore/antietam-battlefield/ These are places I visited during my initial tour, the rest were taken in my research trip when I stayed at the lovely Mary Hill House. This old house stood during the battle and still has a blood stain on the wood floor of the living room!

Thanks for sharing with us, Sandra. You should come out of hiding more often!

Moore enjoys life in the historically rich Cumberland Valley where traffic jams are a thing of the past and there are only two stoplights in the whole town.

She is author of the LaTisha Barnhart Mystery series, complete with a new LaTisha short mystery found in A Cup of Cozy, as well as new historical romance release “A Heartbeat Away” set in Sharpsburg, Maryland–Can a quilt and a hidden message bring enemies together?

For more information, visit her Website at www.sdionnemoore.com.

Follow her on Twitter: @sdionnemoore
Pinterest: http://www.pinterest.com/sdionnemoore
Linkedin: http://www.linkedin.com/sdionnemoore

Read More

The Love Story that Finds Us All by Author Emily Wierenga

I was in Africa a couple of months ago on a bloggers’ trip, in a place called Widow’s Village in rural Rwanda. This village is government-funded, and provides housing for widows and children of the genocide. 

The women are older now, but their faces bear the scars of the horrendous losses they’ve suffered. Many of them have been raped, and have watched their husbands and children be killed. Some have lost nine of eleven children. Others are now taking care of their daughters’ children because their daughters have gone mad and run away.

I was there one day when my team leader asked if any of the women wanted to tell their story. And surprisingly, they did. They wanted to tell their story. 

Because no matter how hard it is, our story is one thing we’ll always have. God gives us our stories, not to define us, but to illuminate his presence on earth. 

Our stories do not define us. They explain us, yes, but they do not define us. God’s love for us defines us, and our stories pave the way to that love. 

At one point one of the widows, Margaret—whose breath smelled slightly of vodka—sat down heavily in the dirt as her sister shared about the genocide and the losses she’d encountered. I sat down with Margaret, there in Africa’s red dirt, and put my arm around her. A child in my lap and Rwanda all around me.

Life is hard. 

Sometimes I say to God, “Look at your people—look at how Earth has done them in.”

But then Margaret whispered, “God is so good.”

I leaned in and she said it again. “God, he’s so good. He gives me everything I need. Praise him.”

This is a woman who’s lost everything. Her children, her husband, her home. She’s witnessed evil face-on. Yet she still believes in goodness. 

Our stories do not define us. They are gifts to us, to show how God steps from heaven to earth on our behalf. To show how our Creator interacts with his creation. Our job is not to control the story, but to read it, and wait for the Savior. To wait for him to come and pull us out of the climax—to pull us out of the evil—and to set the lonely in families. 

And this setting the lonely in families is what takes place in my debut novel, A Promise in Pieces. Clara Wilson is a preacher’s daughter who finds it hard to reconcile the faith her daddy preaches Sunday morning with the war happening across the ocean. She slips out one night, through the window of her bedroom, and runs away with a friend to serve as a nurse in Normandy, France, where she comes face to face with evil, and meets a dying soldier who breathes life back into her fractured faith. 

And it’s a letter this soldier gives her, to take home to his soon-to-be-widowed wife, which leads Clara to the family she’s always longed for—while restoring the one she already has. 

We all are like children, longing to belong, and I relate to Clara. I too am a preacher’s daughter who traveled the globe searching for the faith my father preached. Trying to find God in the corners of the earth, and then my Mum got sick. And I found God where I least expected, at the bedside of my dying mom. 

And when Clara finally arrives back home, a baby quilt from the soldier’s wife in her hands, she too is broken by her mother’s illness and spends her days as a midwife and her nights caring for her parents. The quilt wrapped around the shoulders of young and old and the pieces of Clara’s life being woven together like patchwork cloth. 

In the end, love finds us all. It finds Clara through a kind carpenter, a war veteran who gardens and carves a cradle for Clara’s adopted child. It found me through a farm boy who gave me roots and at the same time, wings.

It finds all of us through our stories which lead us to a God who never leaves or forsakes us—who leans close to us as we sit on the red dirt, in the middle of our suffering, and says, “Come home, child. Come home.”

Emily T. Wierenga is an award-winning journalist, commissioned artist and columnist, as well as the author of four books including A Promise in Pieces, releasing April 15 with Abingdon Press. She lives in Alberta, Canada with her husband and two sons. For more info, please visit www.emilywierenga.com. Find her on Twitter or Facebook.

Read More

7 Ways to Nourish the Writer by Author Vanetta Chapman

I thought I’d talk to you today about “taking care of the writer.” 

We talk a lot about formatting, scene and sequence, characterization, plots, even synopsis … but we rarely talk about the writer.

Whether you are a writer or just know someone who is, I think there are certain things that you can do to take care of yourself.

1. Let go of the guilt. Many of us feel pulled in a dozen different directions. When we do finally sit down to write, we feel guilty—because we’re not doing something else. Clothes need folding, or dishes need washing, or maybe the lawn needs to be mowed! All those are good things, but when you do sit down to write—just write. Let the guilt go.
2. Get some sleep. I know we all want to write the book. We have the characters and ideas and plots in our mind. However, our body needs rest. Even when I was teaching full time and writing for multiple houses, I made sure I had 6 hours of sleep during the week and 7-8 on weekends. Your body and your  mind needs that time. In my opinion, you’re better off writing one hour instead of two, if it means you get the sleep you need.
3. Step away from the computer! Oh my, between blogging, writing, and social media I could sit at my computer for EVER. Because I’m never really done. It’s hard for me to swallow that one. I always thought I could complete any to-do list if I focused. It’s important to realize that you need to step away from the computer. You need to eat, spend time with your family, and take a walk outside. You need to LIVE, and when you do – you’re writing will be much richer.
4. Say yes to your family. I will confess that when my children were young, and I was writing, there was a note on the door. “Don’t knock unless you’re bleeding – a LOT.” I was serious too. Mom’s time in the cave was important. However, my kids are older now, grown and moved out of the house. And I almost never turn them down if they call and ask me to go see a movie, or eat dinner, or let them come and do laundry. We play board games or watch old movies on tv. We spend time together. They really are more important to me than words on a page.
5. Take Sunday off. I know. I know. When my pastor first spoke on this, I asked him, “Do you mean like … every Sunday?” He decided I needed an intervention. But the truth is that we all need a day of rest. And it’s sort of – well, a commandment. So take one day off a week, whether it’s Sunday or some other day.
6. Get moving. When I’m stuck on a word, a get down on the floor and do 10 sit-ups. When I make my word count, I reward myself with a visit to the gym or a 20 minute walk through the neighborhood. Then I come back home and start working on the blogs, marketing, and accounting. We have to take care of ourselves physically, or our writing will suffer.
7. Eat what your body needs. You body does not need Cheetos or chunky monkey ice cream or a 2 liter of soda. You need fruits, vegetables, and a lot of water. You need a little meat and cheese. It’s pretty easy really. Want to feel good? Want to write well? Eat and when you do, eat the right things.

It probably sounds like I don’t spend any time writing. But I do! Honest! I spend at least 8 hours a day, and when I was working full time I spent 2 hours before work and 2 hours after. I love to write. I love to sit in from of my computer and make it up. I have a set word goal every day, and I write 3-4 books a year. I’m focused—like a laser. But it’s very important to take care of myself. If that means that I don’t have time for Candy Crush, that’s okay. If it means that I have one less post on Facebook, that’s okay. Set your priorities, and then follow them – and make one priority taking care of yourself.

If this list seems impossible, start with one item. Bless yourself in one way for a month. Then go back to the list and choose one more.

May your rest, and your writing, be everything you’ve dreamed it will be.

Vannetta Chapman is the author of several novels, including A Promise for Miriam and Falling to Pieces. She discovered her love for the Amish while researching her grandfather’s birthplace in Albion, Pennsylvania. Vannetta won the 2012 Carol award for best mystery. She is also a multi-award-winning member of Romance Writers of America. She write Amish romance for Harvest House, Amish mysteries for Zondervan and Amish novellas for Abingdon. Vannetta was a teacher for 15 years and currently resides in the Texas Hill country. For more information, visit her at www.VannettaChapman.com.

SOCIAL MEDIA LINKS

webpage--www.vannettachapman.com

facebook -- www.facebook.com/VannettaChapmanBooks

twitter -- @VannettaChapman

pinterest -- pinterest.com/vannettachapman

youtube -- check out my youtube page. It's at http://www.youtube.com/user/vannettachapman/videos#

Return Friday for a chance to win a copy of Vanetta's new release!

Read More

Got Popcorn? We Have a Video

We're excited about a new release this month by our own S. Dionne Moore.

A Heartbeat Away is a civil war romance that takes place in Sharpsburg, Maryland. This is right near her home turf, the beautiful Cumberland Valley in South Central Pennsylvania.

The book is Sandra's eleventh title altogether (three of which have been Carol Award finalists), and the seventh in the Quilts of Love series by Abingdon Press.  Her other books include the three very fun Latisha Barnhart mysteries as well as seven historical romances set in Pennsylvania and Wyoming. Interested? Check them out here on her website.

But before you do that, we've got a special treat for you: a trailer for Sandra's new book:


       
AHeartbeatAway - Medium from S. Dionne Moore on Vimeo.

Make sure to stop by tomorrow to enter to win a free copy of A Heartbeat Away!

Read More

The Myth of Writer's Block by Author S. Dionne Moore

        I hate to say this, but writer’s block might just be another way of saying “undisciplined.” It’s hard to write when the words aren’t flowing. I’ve been to that store and shopped in their gift store. Those days feel like walking through heavy, wet snow, at least 12” inches deep in the blowing, frigid wind, with a wind chill factor of 0 degrees. Getting the picture?             
       The point is no one likes hard days. We want everyday to be a 2500 word count goal accomplished-within-3-hours type of day. But life just doesn’t work like that, and as creatures prone to emotion, we often find ourselves unproductive not because we can’t be productive, but because it’s easier not to be. 

Ask anyone who writes for a living, with multiple deadlines, and they will tell you that they don’t have time for writer’s block. These are the people who will be productive and make progress consistently. They are also those who new or young writers will hold in awe. “You do 2500 words a day? I wish I could do that.” Well, you can. There is no secret to breaking through writer’s block except just doing it. Sitting your soft spot in a chair, focusing on your story, and tapping out the words, one sentence at a time. 

The process of writing a marketable product doesn’t come magically but only with experience. The more you write and participate in classes on writing--absorbing the subject as a whole--the more honed your storytelling will become. You begin to understand the connection between backstory and characterization, as well as the power of defining goal, motivation and conflict before you start. Does this do away with seat-of-the-pants writing? No, absolutely not, but it is much easier to stay within the parameters of your story when you have built the framework for the character’s journey ahead of time.

Many times a writer becomes discouraged one-third of the way into writing the story and claims writer’s block, but those are the times your subconscious is probably turning you back toward your GMC and synopsis. Exploring these outlines often hold the key to the reason why the story has become derailed. This is why you need this backbone--a synopsis--pounded out before you begin writing. It will save you from deleting a lot of words. And it will become the map you use to write your story and avoid becoming mired in the myth that is writer’s block.

Moore enjoys life in the historically rich Cumberland Valley where traffic jams are a thing of the past and there are only two stoplights in the whole town. 

A three time Carol Award finalist, Moore is celebrating the release of her tenth historical romance, A Heartbeat Away, part of the Quilts of Love series by Abingdon Press. Visit her at her site: http://www.sdionnemoore.com

Read More