How I Self-Edit My Books

I know many of you are not only readers but writers as well. We all develop our own system for both writing and editing. And as I continue through the slogging process of editing my own latest novel, I thought it would be fun to take a break and give you a peek into how [...]

What Inspires My Writing (Pt 1)

Hardship. Hardship is something I’ve known off and on all my life, although the past few years have been especially trying for various reasons. I believe everyone comes to a point during hard times where they have the choice: Be weakened and destroyed by your trials, or be strengthened and learn from them. All the [...]

When Winter Won’t Go Away

I'm not sure what you're experiencing in your part of the world, but here in Missouri, winter keeps coming back. Fortunately, I love winter and snow. Unfortunately, snow makes it harder to get out and DO things. But more hibernating days means more writing days! And I've been taking full advantage of those. My new [...]

My First Year of NaNoWriMo

After brainstorming, planning, and outlining my next novel for the two or three months previous to November, I felt this year would be as good a time as any to finally participate in National Novel Writing Month. Though I didn't reach 50,000 words, I did reach my own personal goal of 25,000. I loved the [...]

Change Is Beautiful

It’s a funny thing how I can await a certain book’s release, eager for months to read it, drool over the premise and the delicious cover art, watch as it is plastered all over Instagram and Facebook . . . and when the day comes and it is in my hands and the first chapters [...]

Authors: Truth vs Myth

Maybe you hope to be an author. Maybe you have a friend who is one. Either way, there are plenty of misconceptions about what happens when a writer becomes published. The minutes I became a published author, these assumptions started popping out of my friends’ and acquaintances mouths until I just had to put aside [...]

Book Blurb Blues

I've been in the process of writing and polishing the back cover description for my upcoming novella. And I'll tell you the truth - it's not fun at all. I keep wanting to shout, "But I'm a book writer, not a blurb writer! I'm good at unraveling my story over the long haul, not condensing [...]

Ramblings on Writing Spaces

Growing up, all my stories and poems and songs and plays - even my first couple of books - went into spiral notebooks. They were badly smudged, with that pesky left-hander pencil smear across most of the pages. I can still remember the smell of pencil shavings and the satisfying rustle of pages turning. I [...]

True Evil in Christian Fiction: Where Do You Stand?

Two things happened recently which made me want to explore this question, which is a rather broad one: Should there be evil … true evil … in Christian fiction? The first thing that made me begin thinking about it was a conversation I had with a family member. She told me that she couldn’t understand [...]

First Drafts and Dragons

Well, my friends, I am feeling a strange mixture of utter relief and tension right now. It's the feeling that comes when a first draft is finished (relief), and edits loom large (tension) .... Yes, you heard me. Mere minutes ago I typed the last sentence of my book. It is the second of a [...]