I am honored to be included among this group of authors.
Who Do I Talk To? A Yada Yada House of Hope Novel, Neta Jackson, Thomas Nelson
A Flickering Light, Jane A. Kirkpatrick, WaterBrook
The Missing, Beverly Lewis, Bethany House
The Prayers of Agnes Sparrow, Joyce Magnin, Abingdon
The Returning, Ann Tatlock, Bethany House
Congratulations everyone!
When last heard from the wise men and friends were last seen circling Bethlehem, unaware that the holy family had been sealed inside a crystal ball overtop the village by a giant angel named Gloria.
Ah, who doesn't want to place the holy family in a peppermint creche complete with zippy the wonder elf as the angel. And in case you were wondering, apparently the candy cane was truly the first Shepherd's crook. 
"uhm, I'd say he was about this long."
Here's the thing,I have been humbled, amazed and even embarassed at tmes at how well The Prayers of Agnes Sparrow is doing out in the world. Good reviews, excellent reviews even, starred review, lots of kudos and lots of folks buying the book. Book Clubs are reading it, friends are touting it's tasty goodness and I am in awe of God for doing this. Soli deo Gloria. But Friday I recieved an honor that I truly need to share with you all. The Prayers of Agnes Sparrow has been named one of the best books of 2009 by Library Journal. Yikes! When I saw this I was actualy stunned for a second or two, I eman I ahd this major brain zap. Wow, my first novel is named one of the best among thirty other really, really good books. But please understand that it takes a village to publish a novel. One of the things that amazed me after I received the contract and started to work with Abingdon Press, was how many people, how many hands touched my manuscript from editorial to design to sales, marketing, publicity, even shipping. So I need to take a moment and thank Abingdon for all they did to make Agnes a success and especially to my editor, Barbara Scott for teaching me so much and for making Agnes so much better than it was when she first saw it. Thank you Abingdon!
Here's the thing, Pigs are not supposed to be orange. Okay, I'm an author but my secret identity is that I work as a classroom aid (classroom cop)for a before and after school program for kids in K through fifth grade. These are children who have parents who work all day and need care for their children before the start of the school day or after. Hence the name of the program. So for several hours a day I work in a classroom. It's a kindergarten classroom and there is this rug, a whimsical, playful children's rug. It's large, oval and colorful and has the alphabet around the outside and a red barn in the middle with typical farm animals scattered about. It's cute, it really is but it also disturbs me. You see, all of the animals, the cow, the chicken, the sheep, the duck etc. are correctly colored. Except the pigs. The pigs are orange, bright, screaming pumpkin orange. I do not understand this and consider it poor color management on behalf of the person or persons responsible. Why? Why go to the effort to correctly color the other animals as they are found in nature and then take out some kind of coloring hostility on these poor,defenseless porkers? Last evening I brought this to the attention of my director and we dashed off an email to the company requesting an explanation of this obvious color catastrophe. I for one do not want the kindergartners to believe that pigs are orange. After all we are in an affluent suburban community and pigs, as well as other farm animals are not exactly running wild through the streets so the children have nothing to compare. So, we'll see if we get an answer from the company about why on earth they made the pigs bright, screaming orange. Pumpkins are orange, oranges are orange. Pigs are pink(ish) and occassionaly white(ish)maybe black but never orange. It is an odd Orangement of colors.
Here's the thing, I miss my Dad today. He was a world war 2 vet, a decorated officer, and present and just about every major battle from being one of the first to land at Normandy on Omaha Beach to the the Battle of the Bulge. Dad loved to tell war stories and I loved to listen. When I was about fifteen or so I discovered a drawer full of pictures, little tiny B&W pictures of my father's tour of duty. He had taken a little Brownie camera with him and documented pretty much everything from boot training to the liberation of Belgium. I put the pictures in an albumn for him and gave it to him as a Father's Day gift. I have the albumn now and treasure it. A few years ago I had the pleasure of editing a book of poetry for a local author. She was writing poems about her experiences during WWII as a child in Belgium. She told about the Nazi's coming at night and taking their blankets and how her father, a doctor, was forced to treat the ailing and injured German soldiers.She told how she hid in dark basements and of air raids and bombs bursting. I told her that my Dad was one of the soldiers who helped free Belgium from the Nazis. She looked at me with tears in her eyes and said, "He was my liberator." And he probably was. I'm proud of my Dad and all the soldiers then and now. Thank you!
Here's the thing, My new novel, Charlotte Figg Takes Over Paradise is not releasing until next Fall. But here's a little look. Let me know what you think.
Welcome to The Paradise Trailer Park where softball is queen, the pie is tasty and the secrets must be told.
Here's a short little teaser synopsis.
Newly widowed Charlotte Figg purchases a double wide trailer, sight unseen and moves to the Paradise Trailer Park with her dog Lucky. Unfortunately, neither the trailer nor Paradise are what Charlotte expected. Her trailer is a ramshackle old place the color of the inside of an Andes mint and in need of major repair and the people of Paradise are harboring more secrets than Bayer has aspirin. Charlotte's new friend Rose Tattoo (there's a reason she has that name) learns that Charlotte played softball and convinces her to rally the women of Paradise into a team. Reluctant at first, Charlotte warms to the notion and is soon coaching the Paradise Angels along with Asa, the one-armed mechanic, and a little person who thinks she's Mickey Mantle.
Meanwhile, Charlotte discovers that the manager of Paradise, Fergus Wrinkel, abuses his wife Suzy. Charlotte sets out to find a way to save Suzy from Fergus and in the process comes to a difficult realization about her own painful marriage. But when Charlotte begins to press the issue, Fergus takes the upper hand and threatens to kill Suzy if Charlotte exposes the truth.
Here's the thing, my mother never turned away a stray animal. I could bring anything home and keep it. Among my many pets there were, dogs, cats, birds, snakes, miscellaneous hamsters, guniea pigs, fish, frogs, turtles, gerbils, mice and even a flying squirrel we named Rocket J. And as many of you know, Flossie was the orginal pet whisperer. I swear the woman could communicate with animals. It was eerie. One day I found a baby bird and brought him home. "His leg is broken," Mom said. Then she placed him in a shoe box and fed him a thick slurry of milk and bread through an eye dropper. Baby, as she called him, grew but his leg just seemed to drag behind him. So Flossie took him to see the vet, Doc Evans and made him amputate the leg. That's right. Flossie arrived home with Baby sporting a fashionable new stump wrapped in white tape. Yep, we had a one-legged robin who liked to ride around the house on the dog's back. Somehow it became my responsibility to dig worms for him. Every morning my mother would wake me and I went out on the daily worm hunt. Until one day I said, "no." It was summer vacation and I did not want to dig worms for the stupid bird anymore. So Flossie decided it was perhaps time to let the bird go. Now we all knew Baby couldn't fly. Birds need two legs to fly. But, undaunted, Flossie took the bird and me outside and instructed me to place him as high as I could on the pine tree. Now I saw the curious cat that waited just a few yards away but still I set Baby on the tree. "All we can do is hope he'll fly," Flossie said. "But whatever happens, it's for the best." I couldn't watch so I went inside and to this day I believe that Baby, the one-legged Robin flew away and lived happily ever after in Birdland. Right.
Guilt--another in a long list of reasons why impressionable girls grow up to be writers.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
