The beginning stages of a novel are often the most fun.   Restrictions and limitations?  Fuhgeddaboudit.  This is the time when a book assumes mythic proportions in the author’s mind.  If not the best book ever written, this will be the best book the author has ever written, each sentence perfectly constructed, each scene building on the last until the story ends with a rousing and satisfying conclusion.  The reader will feel as if he/she has lost friends and yearn for their return.  All those things the author always wanted to say but couldn’t, will finally be said.

Then reality sets in.

Right now, in true Dickensian imitation, I’m poised somewhere between Great Expectations and Bleak House.  On one hand, I still believe my new idea will be, if not my best, certainly one of them.  On the other, the reality of the task before me is enough to make me turn off my computer and turn down my covers for a long winter’s nap.

In coming days I know I will wrestle with ever aspect of my new idea.  But first up, and most important?  I must find a way to make my protagonist sympathetic. (more…)

“If the only prayer you said in your whole life was thank you, that would be enough.”  ~Meister Eckhart 

“We can only be said to be alive in those moments when our hearts are conscious of our treasures.”  ~Thornton Wilder 

“On Thanksgiving Day, we acknowledge our dependence.” ~William Jennings Bryan

“Feeling gratitude and not expressing it is like wrapping a present and not giving it.” ~William Arthur Ward (more…)

I had the good fortune to visit Guatemala in early 2009, an unusual journey since I’d written about the political struggles in Guatemala in my novel Endless Chain, the second book of my Shenandoah Album series, but had never visited the country.  Although only the back story took place in Guatemala, I found it strange to write about a place I’d never seen and experienced.  So when our church organized a social justice delegation to be based in Antigua, with excursions into the Mayan Highlands, I gladly signed on.  You can read about that trip here and here, or search under my “travel” category for even more. 

Recently when a second trip was planned, I had to say no, since I had promised to help out after the birth of our new grandchild.  But my husband went again, camera in hand.  And this time, the group was there during the Day of the Dead, November 1st.  They took part in the wonderful kite flying festival in the village of Sumpango, and came back with lots of photos. (To see more plus my original Guatemala album, you can access here if you’re  registered at Facebook.) (more…)

**Congratulations to Paula, commenter #2, whose number was chosen at random.org and will now receive an autographed copy of Love Finds You in Sugarcreek, Ohio.  Thanks to everyone who “chatted” here with Serena while the giveaway was in progress.

Some years ago I received an email from another minister’s wife, an aspiring author.  She wanted to know what kinds of issues, if any, I had run into with my husband’s congregation because of my novels.  She, too, wanted to be a published novelist, but she was looking for exactly the right publishing home.  I liked her immediately and we began a correspondence.  A year later when she drove to West Virginia from her Ohio home to meet me at a conference, we were already friends and have remained so through the years. (more…)

Merry Go Round From Benutzer KMJ

There I was reading Everyday Foods magazine while my granddaughter chattered beside me.  “I get this at home,” I told my son-in-law, “but I haven’t had time to read it in a year.”  There was a silence, then he said, “You know, something’s wrong with that, Mom.”

Indeed there is.  (more…)

I’ve been lucky, although for a long time I didn’t notice.  While I am clearly a small town/rooted for generations/never need to move kind of woman, I have only lived in one small town, where we had no family ties.  We moved on after six years.  I am married to a minister, and moving comes with the territory.

Since I married my husband I have lived in seven states, sojourned in another as well as Australia, and I’ve lived in both the north and south of the Old Dominion, which is, as anyone who’s done that knows, like living in two different countries.  I’ve lived in suburbia, on a mountain top, big cities, small cities and places in between.

Recently I had the opportunity to return to one of my former homes, Cleveland, OH, where two of my married children remained.  I’m here to welcome a new family member, Allison Nicole, who made her appearance early Monday morning.  I won’t regale you with tales of how perfect she is, how precious it is to rock a newborn and watch as her expressions change and the world begins to form for her.  It defies words.  There is no experience like it. (more…)

While I’m out of town visiting family and waiting for the arrival of the new grandchild, I thought I’d share a blog I wrote for Fresh Fiction in June of 2009.  A search tells me it never appeared here, so enjoy now.  I’ll be back with new blogs next week.

Which comes first, the novel or the title?

There is no question that authors are odd. We hear voices in our heads. We stare blankly at walls for hours, leaving those around us to wonder if we have, without fanfare, passed away. We save things other people toss out or never possess in the first place. Real estate circulars. Missing children inserts. Photographs that show nothing except, perhaps, the curve of a cheek or the shape of an eye. We keep files. Oh yes, we keep lots and lots of files. Jotted notes of overheard conversations. Newspaper articles about mortgage fraud. Three word phrases that might vanish in the night.

Authors are almost always asked where our ideas come from. No matter how many times I’m asked, I’m not annoyed by this question. In fact I can relate. Myself, I wonder about architects, particularly those who design hotel lobbies and airports. Where did those ideas originate, and can we please extinguish the source? Or artists. Take Jackson Pollock. What possessed the man, other than an urge to pour lots of paint on lots of canvas? (more…)

Since I’m traveling today, I thought you might enjoy a blog I wrote last fall for Suzanne Beecher who runs “Dear Reader“ book clubs online.  Suzanne’s book clubs are a great way to have book excerpts sent directly to you each weekday, in a genre you choose.

For the record, and a year later, I did NOT plant potatoes this growing season.  But next year?  Who knows?

Enjoy.

I’ll confess I’m enchanted by thoughts of buried treasure. Novelists are a romantic lot. My practical friends see tumbledown houses and vacant lots, and they think about septic fields and new construction. I see stories buried in the rubble. Beside that spindly willow? A chest with great-grandmother’s pearls and a photo of the man she lost, protected against the ages in a heart-shaped locket. Under those decaying steps? Letters from a long dead president, explaining why he did or didn’t go to war, and how the decision haunted him.

With that in mind, with thoughts of a hundred possibilities, today I dug in my own front yard. Not for gold coins. Not gold jewelry. Yukon gold potatoes. Buried last spring where sensible people would have planted shrubs. Buried with hope and ceremony and tender, loving care. (more…)

One of the joys of living in Northern Virginia is experiencing the past.  So much American history was made right here, and no drive into the nation’s capital goes by without finding a building I’ve never noticed before, in which events that rocked the world took place.

When the National Park Service recently offered a chance to visit Arlington House, the former  home of Robert E. Lee–in what is now Arlington Cemetery–I jumped at the opportunity.  The event was a kick-off for the commemoration of the sesquicentennial of the Civil War, which will be observed over the next five years.  This particular event was a look at the presidential election of 1860, in which four candidates competed for office.  As part of the evening’s entertainment, we were to listen to four re-enactors stumping for “their” candidate, then vote, even those of us of the female persuasion, and those people of color among us, neither of which had any say in the real election.

We’re particularly interested in all things Lincoln at my house.  My husband’s family claims a relationship through a great-great-grandmother who was a cousin of Lincoln’s mother.  As these things go, the story is more fun than doing the actual geneaology would be.  But, of course, we went to cast our vote for Cousin Abe.

The evening was perfect, cool and clear, and the road leading up to Arlington House was softly illuminated by lanterns.  Our National Park Service guide was charming and well-informed, and the walk to the house was lovely with a moon shining brightly and the lights of the city below. As we were serenaded by a period brass band, our mission was to listen to supporters of each of the four candidates give stump speeches, complete with costumes and soap boxes, and decide for ourselves which man–of course they were all men–to vote for.  In a gesture of 21st century concilliation, even the women and people of color in the crowd were allowed to cast ballots.

That’s when the evening began to feel “real” to me.  Because even though 150 years have passed since the campaign leading up to Lincoln’s election (in which 60% of voters voted AGAINST him) listening to the various candidates’ supporters, I felt as if I were sitting in front of my own television set, watching the increasingly obnoxious ads in the Maryland governor’s race and local Virginia races too numerous to mention.

Without fail, in almost every one of these campaigns, past and present, the ads or speakers have twisted the facts about the other candidate’s record, refused to address the real issues facing the people they want to govern, avoided giving any actual information about their plans for our future or how they’ll go about accomplishing them.  They promise no new taxes, while also promising expensive solutions.  They point fingers, avoid answering questions and hope that buzz words will carry the day instead of logic.  Those with money  try to buy their way into our voting booths.

Lincoln’s campaigner was every bit as off key as the rest.   I wonder if, at the end of that particular speech, Lincoln would have stepped forward to say, “I’m Abraham Lincoln, and I approved this message.”

This is a serious time in our country’s history, and the following is not a partisan request. Whatever you do, whomever you vote for, together let’s “ignore” the ads and the speeches and the cute nicknames that tell us nothing we need to know when we go to the polls on Tuesday.  Let’s do our homework and vote with clear heads for the candidates who have been honest and taken a risk to tell us what they believe and really plan to do.   Maybe if we do, eventually, candidates will begin to do more of the same.

A hundred and fifty years have gone by since the election of 1860, but despite a flawed process, I think we made a good choice with Cousin Abe.  Now let’s wend our way through the garbage strewn trail of television lies, and do it again this year.