A week ago today, I gave a safe-travels hug to a Florida Christian bookseller, then hefted the two-pound bag of Phoenix Roasters coffee that I’d won in a drawing and headed to my car. It was time to leave the Christian Product Expo (CPE) in Concord, North Carolina, where I’d spent the last three action-packed…
Tag: #thedemonsamongus
Biting my nails…
Last month the unwitting members of the North Georgia Chapter of the American Christian Fiction Writers (ACFW) elected me as their 2022 president. I tried to explain that online technology baffles me and I’ll be unable to lead those highly popular hybrid online meetings. They firmly replied that the vice president ALWAYS ascends to the…
A Perk and a Privilege
After I posted that Redemption Press had published The Demons Among Us, a flood of calls… and emails… and texts… and social media messages washed into my smart devices. It’s been overwhelming and wonderful. I’ve heard from people I haven’t spoken to in years—people whom I thought had forgotten all about me and my writing…
Deep breaths
During a Bible study, my teacher cautioned the class about praying for patience. “Since God answers our prayers, but not always in the way we expect,” she said, “He might place us in a situation that tries our patience in order to teach us a lesson.” Over the years I’ve found that advice to be…
Join the party!
You’re invited to help me celebrate the launch of The Demons Among Us through a Zoom party Sunday, October 10, at 4 p.m. EDT. I’ll talk a little bit about my publishing journey, answer questions, read the first few pages of the book, and host a couple games with prizes. I regret we can’t celebrate…
5 Steps to Creating a Book Trailer
A book trailer! All the marketing gurus advised me of its merits to authors of young adult books: teens love visuals, they love YouTube, and they click on the buy links more often than after they read book summaries. I sighed and rolled up my sleeves. I’d created employee communications videos in a former job,…
Baking & Bonding
In my young adult novel, The Demons Among Us (launching in September), the sixteen-year-old main character, Joy, is learning to cook. An early scene with Joy and her mom baking homemade sweet potato fries is loosely based on the times my daughter, Julia, and I share a kitchen. Even though she’s now married and lives…
I’ve signed with a publisher!
What a long journey! When I sold my public relations firm in 2013 and decided to write a book, I had no idea what a steep learning curve I’d encounter. My end goal was to publish an alternative to the stories about witches, vampires and werewolves—something with a touch of paranormal, but biblically based. I…
My path to a national contest win
When you hear God’s voice say, “Trust me,” listen and obey. He’s serious. Over the past few weeks, I’ve been grumbling that the three publishers to whom I’d submitted The Demons Among Us haven’t replied. I’d been told it would be six to eight weeks before I heard anything . . . if I heard…