Writing Life
I began writing fiction seriously in the early 2000s. My first draft was an embarrassing 160,000 words (or more) and I actually had two sweet friends who read the monstrosity. But as bad as it was, it was on paper. Eventually I pared it down to about 100,000 words or so, and submitted it to two clearinghouses that were available at the time for "Christian" fiction, a word I don't like but figured would be a start. This was before (but not long) Amazon began to make a fortune off of people self-publishing on Kindle and it was still a huge accomplishment to get one's book in print.
It was "discovered" by Ramona Tucker and Jeff Nesbitt of OakTara and I was one of their first writers, for which I will be forever grateful. In 2008 Traveling Through was published, and in 2012 republished with a different cover and some edits prior to the release of its two sequels.
The book is about a young woman and her husband who find themselves in an impossible situation, do the right thing as they see it, and live with the consequences. It explores whether doing the right thing has easy outcomes. It doesn't always. It also explores the tension between public and private, political and personal, and what happens when a cause becomes too important. It is not a typical Christian book. Two readers recently told me how they cried at the end, which might be a response of many.
I do not think the book has gotten the attention it deserves, but that is my fault. The reason I have trouble settling down into my next novel is that writing is so hard with no guaranteed outcomes. I know how hard it is to produce a novel of quality and have no fantasies about it. I don't know how to produce a bad novel that will sell, like some seem to.
If you are local, I can get you a copy easily. You can get copies on bookseller websites a little cheaper.
It was "discovered" by Ramona Tucker and Jeff Nesbitt of OakTara and I was one of their first writers, for which I will be forever grateful. In 2008 Traveling Through was published, and in 2012 republished with a different cover and some edits prior to the release of its two sequels.
The book is about a young woman and her husband who find themselves in an impossible situation, do the right thing as they see it, and live with the consequences. It explores whether doing the right thing has easy outcomes. It doesn't always. It also explores the tension between public and private, political and personal, and what happens when a cause becomes too important. It is not a typical Christian book. Two readers recently told me how they cried at the end, which might be a response of many.
I do not think the book has gotten the attention it deserves, but that is my fault. The reason I have trouble settling down into my next novel is that writing is so hard with no guaranteed outcomes. I know how hard it is to produce a novel of quality and have no fantasies about it. I don't know how to produce a bad novel that will sell, like some seem to.
If you are local, I can get you a copy easily. You can get copies on bookseller websites a little cheaper.
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