Weekly Drawing

It's Fun Friday at The Borrowed Book! This week's prize is available to residents inside the continental US only.

To enter:

Leave the time it took you to complete the puzzles in the comments section as well as your email address for notifying you if you've won. Winners will be drawn from ALL of the times, so the person with the fastest time may not be the actual winner, but by leaving your time, you double your chances.

Want another entry? Tweet your puzzle time and mention The Borrowed Book, get another entry. RETWEET our Tweet, get two entries!

Post your puzzle time on BB's Facebook wall and...you guessed it...get another entry!

Post it on your OWN Facebook wall and you could get as many as FIVE entries.

It's all a way to spread the word about the great giveaways on BB. So c'mon! Help us spread the word, and have a little fun at the same time. Enter all weekend long! Winners will be announced Sunday night at midnight.

This week's puzzle feature is brought to you by Lynette Sowell and her newest release, A Season of Change.

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An Unexpected Destination, by Lynette Sowell

I will start out this post with a confession: I never imagined I’d write an Amish fiction series. Never.

I wasn’t one of those naysayers who grit their teeth as they walk past the bookstore shelves and see all the models wearing head coverings on the books. You might have heard or seen the naysayers. They mumble something about sticking a bonnet on the heroine of their next book, and seeing what happens. Before writing the Seasons in Pinecraft series, I’d read a handful of titles from authors like Beverly Lewis and Amy Clipston. I enjoyed them very much.

But here I am, holding this ‘newborn’ book in my hands. The cover not only has the colors of the circus big top, but a beach, and an Amish man with two small children. And a very modern heroine.

One of the things I’ve always prayed for concerning my writing is that doors would open and doors would close, and I would discern between the two. If you’ve been a writer for a while, you might have learned as I have that sometimes “no” doesn’t mean a door is shut. Not permanently, anyway.

I first encountered Pinecraft four years ago, when my then-editor at Heartsong asked if I’d think about writing an Amish book series set in Texas. Folks, when an acquisitions editor asks you to see what you can come up with for a proposal, it just might be worth checking out. So, I did.

I learned the Texas climate has not been kind to the few Amish who’ve tried to settle in Texas. Any 20^th and early 21^st settlements are very small, a handful of families. I didn’t feel that “spark” alerting me there might be a story somewhere in those meager facts.

Then, it happened. I was cruising through a very informative website called Amish America. One of its features is a directory of settlements throughout the country. And then, I saw the picture. I’m a visual person, so this picture made me sit up and take notice.

A woman in a head covering and cape dress was sitting on an adult-size tricycle outside a small building with a postal sign across the top of the wall. The photo was of the Pinecraft post office in Sarasota. And then, I felt that “spark” as I read.

There’s a story here, I told myself. Maybe. After that, I started to read up on the city of Sarasota, and what distinguishes it from other cities. Sarasota has a rich circus history, and the Ringling family has left a large legacy to the city, which has an art museum as well as a circus museum. There’s also a circus school for children where they can   

learn how to perform juggling, tumbling, trapeze, aerial acts and tightrope.

When I saw the glitz and sparkle of the circus world and the Plain world of the Amish beside each other in the same city, I knew my hero and heroine would both come from these different worlds. And that’s when I began to chase the story of Jacob Miller and Natalie Bennett, an Amish widower and an aerial artist turned circus instructor.

If you are a writer, you’ll understand the twists and turns of pre-publication world. Thanks to my agent, Sandra Bishop, and her tenacity and belief in this series, the stories of Pinecraft found a home at

Abingdon Press.

Fast forward to January 2012, when I boarded a plane for Tampa and then headed to Sarasota, to stay in Pinecraft and become better acquainted with this intriguing Plain community. I walked its streets, ate the delicious food, and soaked in the atmosphere. When Pinecraft resident Katie Troyer asked me to go to a singing, I jumped at the opportunity, and we rode our bicycles over to the Mullets’ house in the Birky Square area, and listened to the music and drank hot chocolate one chilly night. Sherry Gore and I braved the crowds at   

the annual Haiti Auction, and we tried not to stuff ourselves too full of lunch plates, pretzels, and other deliciousness. I was blessed to visit Pinecraft again in February 2013, and I hope to return to the village sometime in the winter of 2014-2015.

I might have never expected to write an Amish book series, but one thing I always aim to do as an author is take my readers on a trip. As these books release, I hope to hear from readers that they feel as if they’ve visited the sunny village of Pinecraft right along with me.

  

Lynette Sowell is the award-winning novelist of more than fifteen titles. When she’s not writing fiction, Lynette works covering local news for the Copperas Cove Leader-Press, where she also writes a weekly column called My Front Porch. She enjoys reading, cooking, watching movies and is always up for a Texas road trip. Lynette was born in Massachusetts, raised on the eastern shore of Maryland, but makes her home in Copperas Cove, Texas, with her husband, along with a spoiled Texas heeler and a pair of cats who have them all well-trained.

Keep up with Lynette Sowell via her blog (lynettesowell.blogspot.com), Facebook page (Lynette Sowell, Author) or Twitter (@LynetteSowell).

Don't forget to stop by The Borrowed Book tomorrow, when you can enter to win a FREE copy of Lynette's new release, A Season of Change!

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Did You Know? ~ Typhoid Outbreak in Rock Island, Illinois

I found an interesting little article in the Kansas City Daily Journal from April 21, 1890.

Quarantine Signs like this one were often used

A College Closed

Rock Island, Ill., Aril 20,--Augustina college, in this city, has been closed on account of an epidemic of typoid fever among the students. About forty of the students have been on the sick list. Twenty of them are not regarded as dangerous, but sixteen cases have developed a malignant form of the disease. Two of the students have died and two others are in a critical state. Sewer gas has been pronounced the cause of the epidemic, as those students who did not eat or sleep in the afflicted building have not been troubled.

Interestingly enough, in 1880, Karl Joseph Eberth, a German pathologist and bacteriologist, described a bacillus that he suspected was the cause of typhoid. In 1884 pathologist Georg Theodor August Gaffky, also from Germany, confirmed Eberth's findings. This article about the college outbreak was published in 1890.

Opposition between medical professionals who held old beliefs and those who were on the cutting edge of new discoveries was rampant in the medical world during these years. Many doctors refused to accept the fact that bacteria, and later on, viruses, even existed. This newspaper article is a good example of how slow this kind of information was to spread across the world and to be accepted.

The cause of the typhoid outbreak that affected these unfortunate students obviously wasn’t sewer gas, although that theory was a popularly held one at the time. The typhoid was spread by eating or drinking beverages that were handled by someone who was shedding Salmonella Typhi, the bacillus that causes the disease. That explains why the disease was limited to the one building. Close quarters like those these students probably lived and ate in would be the perfect breeding ground for typhoid. .

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My Writing Alter-Ego by Author Lynette Sowell

I don’t keep it a secret, but besides writing fiction, I also write about things that aren’t make-believe stories about the imaginary characters in my head. 

I write about living, breathing characters. I’m a freelance reporter for my city newspaper and I’ve been doing it for over four years now. What began as answering a simple ad in the paper looking for writers has opened a door, window, or what have you to a local world I didn’t even know about. 

Or, care much about until I knew more. 

Two years into reporting, the newspaper publishers asked if I’d write a weekly column. 

“What does it have to be about?” I asked. 

“Anything you want,” was the reply. And so, in May 2012, “My Front Porch” began. That’s when I get to give my opinion, something I can’t insert into a news story, no matter how much I’d like to sometimes.

One thing I’ve learned in being a reporter is that someone, somewhere cares about the person or event I’m writing about. In any given week, I can be reporting about the city council, the school board, interviewing an interesting local person for a feature article, showing up at an accident or crime scene, or covering a school program or a bake sale. 

Among my favorite interviews was interviewing a Pearl Harbor survivor who lives in our city, and getting his firsthand perspective on something that’s followed him since he was a 20-year-old soldier stationed in Hawaii.

Another interview special to me was listening to my mayor, who watched our central Texas community grow from a population of 300 when he graduated high school—to over 30,000 residents—more than 100 times the size he once knew.

I’ve interviewed politicians (who always like to talk), met the governor of Texas, rubbed elbows with Congressmen, crashed an Election night after-party, and I’ve interviewed not one, but two NFL players. The limelight is indeed bright and intoxicating if you stand long enough in its glow, and sometimes it’s tempting to name-drop.

My heart broke when I followed the story of a 10-year-old girl who learned she had terminal cancer. I covered her story from fundraisers, to her final arrangements and the family’s efforts to pay for her burial.  

I interviewed a woman in our city who finished a mere three minutes before the bombs exploded at the 2013 Boston 

Marathon; it brought the tragedy even closer to home. 

Another thing I’ve learned in being a reporter is no town is too small to have real news, that all of us have an important story to share. When we stop caring about stories—well, I couldn’t imagine anyone not caring about stories anymore, the real news unfolding in our communities, country and world, or the stories some of us make up because we can’t help NOT making up stories. 

So even if you live somewhere you think is quite ordinary, I hope you’ll take a moment and look around you. Get to know your city, really know it. Not just your church and your favorite restaurant and local market. You might be surprised at the treasure trove you find, and if you’re a writer, you’ll find even more characters start clamoring for your attention in your imagination. 

Lynette Sowell is the award-winning novelist of more than fifteen titles. When she’s not writing fiction, Lynette works covering local news for the Copperas Cove Leader-Press, where she also writes a weekly column called My Front Porch. She enjoys reading, cooking, watching movies and is always up for a Texas road trip. Lynette was born in Massachusetts, raised on the eastern shore of Maryland, but makes her home in Copperas Cove, Texas, with her husband, along with a spoiled Texas heeler and a pair of cats who have them all well-trained.

Keep up with Lynette Sowell via her blog (lynettesowell.blogspot.com), Facebook page (Lynette Sowell, Author) or Twitter (@LynetteSowell). 

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Beauty & the Beast Writing Contest

I'm sure many of our readers here at the BB are also writers...am I right? It just comes with the territory. ;) If you're a writer looking for a fun writing prompt and a possible opportunity to be published in a novella collection, check out this announcement from Rooglewood Press!

* * * 

Rooglewood Press is delighted to introduce their second fairy tale novella contest—

 

Five Enchanted Roses 

a collection of “Beauty and the Beast” stories 

The challenge is to write a retelling of the beloved fairy tale in any genre or setting you like. Make certain your story is recognizably “Beauty and the Beast,” but have fun with it as well. Make it yours!

Rooglewood Press will be selecting five winners to be published in the Five Enchanted Roses collection, which will be packaged up with the gorgeous cover you see displayed here. Perhaps your name will be one of the five displayed on this cover?

All the contest rules and information (how to enter, story details, deadline etc.) may be found on the Rooglewood Press website. Just click HERE and you will go right to the page.

Rooglewood Press’s first collection, Five Glass Slippers, is available for pre-order now and will be released on June 14. Do grab yourself a copy and see what these talented writers have done with the timeless “Cinderella” tale!

* * * 

Note: This cover illustration was rendered by Julia Popova, “ForestGirl.” You can find out more about this gifted artist on her website: www.forestgirl.ru

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Winners!!

Good morning, BB fans! Thanks to everyone who participated in our "puzzling" Friday giveaway! Keep all those facebook and Twitter notifications, coming!

This week's winner is: 

Michelle (Bookwormgal2011 at yahoo dot com) - Final Trimester by Dianna T. Benson.
 
Congratulations, Michelle! Thank you all so much for stopping by The Borrowed Book.

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Sunday Devotional: Psalm 18

So what’s our answer to those who say, “God will never respond to our prayers”?

He will. He does. Not in our time and way, maybe, but ...

As I mentioned last week, while some Psalms seem thrown down in the heat of desperation, but others read like carefully sculpted works of art—and Psalm 18 is one of the latter.

If anyone had ever tasted desperation, it was David. Dismissed as the youngest and least of Jesse’s sons, left to care for the sheep when the prophet Samuel came to call, he nevertheless found himself summoned and anointed king, possibly with the stink of the field still on him—then sent back out to serve. Later caught again in the moment when the armies of Israel, including his older brothers, were being challenged by the Philistine champion, Goliath. We all know the story of how he took it upon himself to step out on the field and take on the giant with nothing but a sling—with which he had considerable and remarkable skill. (All that practice while tending sheep!) Later still, the favorite of King Saul—and then the unintended enemy of the same. The lad who stood without fear before a nine-foot mutant became a man who felt keenly the strain of being on the run from a king he was supposed to respect—but that he knew he was destined to replace.

Psalm 18 is, I suspect, a prayer he first uttered in desperation, but later shaped into the glorious poem we read it as today. It’s a bit long, but oh so worth it for sheer beauty ... and rest to our hearts.

Don’t be disturbed by the seeming insinuation that God rescued David because he was somehow worthy. This is the same man who wrote in the Psalm immediately previous, “My righteousness is nothing apart from you.” He knew well his own frailty.

Psalm 18 (NKJV)

To the Chief Musician. A Psalm of David the servant of the Lord, who spoke to the Lord the words of this song on the day that the Lord delivered him from the hand of all his enemies and from the hand of Saul. And he said:

I will love You, O Lord, my strength.
² The Lord is my rock and my fortress and my deliverer;
My God, my strength, in whom I will trust;
My shield and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold.
³ I will call upon the Lord, who is worthy to be praised;
So shall I be saved from my enemies.

⁴ The pangs of death surrounded me,
And the floods of ungodliness made me afraid.
⁵ The sorrows of Sheol surrounded me;
The snares of death confronted me.
⁶ In my distress I called upon the Lord,
And cried out to my God;
He heard my voice from His temple,
And my cry came before Him, even to His ears.

⁷ Then the earth shook and trembled;
The foundations of the hills also quaked and were shaken,
Because He was angry.
⁸ Smoke went up from His nostrils,
And devouring fire from His mouth;
Coals were kindled by it.
⁹ He bowed the heavens also, and came down
With darkness under His feet.
¹⁰ And He rode upon a cherub, and flew;
He flew upon the wings of the wind.
¹¹ He made darkness His secret place;
His canopy around Him was dark waters
And thick clouds of the skies.
¹² From the brightness before Him,
His thick clouds passed with hailstones and coals of fire.

¹³ The Lord thundered from heaven,
And the Most High uttered His voice,
Hailstones and coals of fire.
¹⁴ He sent out His arrows and scattered the foe,
Lightnings in abundance, and He vanquished them.
¹⁵ Then the channels of the sea were seen,
The foundations of the world were uncovered
At Your rebuke, O Lord,
At the blast of the breath of Your nostrils.

¹⁶ He sent from above, He took me;
He drew me out of many waters.
¹⁷ He delivered me from my strong enemy,
From those who hated me,
For they were too strong for me.
¹⁸ They confronted me in the day of my calamity,
But the Lord was my support.
¹⁹ He also brought me out into a broad place;
He delivered me because He delighted in me.

²⁰ The Lord rewarded me according to my righteousness;
According to the cleanness of my hands
He has recompensed me.
²¹ For I have kept the ways of the Lord,
And have not wickedly departed from my God.
²² For all His judgments were before me,
And I did not put away His statutes from me.
²³ I was also blameless before Him,
And I kept myself from my iniquity.
²⁴ Therefore the Lord has recompensed me according to my righteousness,
According to the cleanness of my hands in His sight.

²⁵ With the merciful You will show Yourself merciful;
With a blameless man You will show Yourself blameless;
²⁶ With the pure You will show Yourself pure;
And with the devious You will show Yourself shrewd.
²⁷ For You will save the humble people,
But will bring down haughty looks.

²⁸ For You will light my lamp;
The Lord my God will enlighten my darkness.
²⁹ For by You I can run against a troop,
By my God I can leap over a wall.
³⁰ As for God, His way is perfect;
The word of the Lord is proven;
He is a shield to all who trust in Him.

³¹ For who is God, except the Lord?
And who is a rock, except our God?
³² It is God who arms me with strength,
And makes my way perfect.
³³ He makes my feet like the feet of deer,
And sets me on my high places.
³⁴ He teaches my hands to make war,
So that my arms can bend a bow of bronze.

³⁵ You have also given me the shield of Your salvation;
Your right hand has held me up,
Your gentleness has made me great.
³⁶ You enlarged my path under me,
So my feet did not slip.

³⁷ I have pursued my enemies and overtaken them;
Neither did I turn back again till they were destroyed.
³⁸ I have wounded them,
So that they could not rise;
They have fallen under my feet.
³⁹ For You have armed me with strength for the battle;
You have subdued under me those who rose up against me.
⁴⁰ You have also given me the necks of my enemies,
So that I destroyed those who hated me.
⁴¹ They cried out, but there was none to save;
Even to the Lord, but He did not answer them.
⁴² Then I beat them as fine as the dust before the wind;
I cast them out like dirt in the streets.

⁴³ You have delivered me from the strivings of the people;
You have made me the head of the nations;
A people I have not known shall serve me.
⁴⁴ As soon as they hear of me they obey me;
The foreigners submit to me.
⁴⁵ The foreigners fade away,
And come frightened from their hideouts.

⁴⁶ The Lord lives!
Blessed be my Rock!
Let the God of my salvation be exalted.
⁴⁷ It is God who avenges me,
And subdues the peoples under me;
⁴⁸ He delivers me from my enemies.
You also lift me up above those who rise against me;
You have delivered me from the violent man.
⁴⁹ Therefore I will give thanks to You, O Lord, among the Gentiles,
And sing praises to Your name.

⁵⁰ Great deliverance He gives to His king,
And shows mercy to His anointed,
To David and his descendants forevermore.

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