Merry Christmas!

With Christmas just around the corner, I want to wish all my readers a very Merry Christmas!

The Christmas season and upcoming year are exciting times for me as I eagerly await the release of two new books. A study guide companion to Prayer: It's Not About You is at the publishers and will be released by Pix-N-Pens in early January. In addition, my debut novel, "The Whisper of the Palms" is also at the publishers and is coming soon from Olivia Kimbrell Press. It's fiction based on fact in that it is the fictionalized retelling of my parents' lives. Stay tuned; I'll keep you posted. 

Enjoy this season of celebrating the birth of the Savior!

Happy Fall! The weather is starting to turn cooler and Thanksgiving is just around the corner.

I have so much to be thankful for this year. Just last week, I realized some the things for which I am thankful that I sometimes take for granted, like good health, and little things too, such as plumbing that doesn't leak and furnaces that work.

This week is election week. I have opinions on politics, but no matter how it all turns out, I am still aware of how blessed I am. My husband had surgery last week and had a few rough days afterwards, my disposal leaked, and my furnace broke just as we experienced our first frost of the season. This week my husband is healing, I have a new disposal, and will soon have a working furnace.

It's almost time to pull out the scarves and overcoats, start planning Thanksgiving dinner, and recall to our minds all that God has blessed us with over the last year. For me that list includes a brand new grand daughter!

It's also time to start reading the seasonal devotional I co-wrote with childhood friend Shirley Crowder titled, Glimpses of the Savior It's now available on Kindle Unlimited too!

More Book News!

More exciting news! I will be collaborating again with childhood friend and co-writer on a previous book, Shirley Crowder, and publishing again with Pix-N-Pens Publishing! We will be writing a Study Guide for "Prayer: It's Not About You." Here we are signing the joint contract for this book that will release in early 2017.

Exciting News!

It's finally here!!!!

Here it is!!!! Now available on Kindle: Prayer: It's Not About You

Summer Reading

I got this picture from a reader friend today. It warmed my heart!

What are you reading this summer?

It’s Here!!!!!

“Prayer moves the arm that moves the universe … Prayer is the greatest privilege man can have.”

This quote is cited in the book, “Soldiers of the Cross” by Kent D. Dollar who found the quote in a hand-written journal from a civil war soldier by the name of Edward Owings Guerrant. I don’t know if this was Guerrant’s original thought or if he heard someone else say it.

I found the book by Dollar about ten years ago in the gift shop of a civil war battle site just outside of Washington D. C. while visiting my son who lived in D. C. at the time. I could just picture a soldier in the throes of war, sitting by himself contemplating prayer and writing about it in his journal.

I can relate. I may not have ever fought in a physical war but I have been in spiritual wars contemplating and journaling about prayer too.

For four years, in fact, I did just that.

At the end of those four years I had a manuscript written on the topic of prayer. Then, it took another almost eight years working on turning that manuscript into a book. It garnered a special recognition along the way when it finaled in the 2011 Women of Faith” unpublished manuscript competition. But until now it had not made it into book form.

Today, at last, I am thrilled to announce that the book is finally out! It can be purchased in paperback and will be available in e-book form in a few more days.

Here’s the link: Prayer: It's Not About You 

Coming Soon!

It's hard to believe its already April! Here's an update on how my book release is coming:  

A mighty spiritual weapon or a waste of time? What exactly is prayer? Is it something to be engaged in fiercely as if wielding a weapon in the midst of a spiritual battle, or is it a just a personal practice to achieve a calmer, more focused, and disciplined life? Does prayer really change anything

Those questions and so many more are discussed inside the pages of my soon-to-be released book, “Prayer: It’s Not About You”. The book does not simply offer one writer’s perspective on the topic of prayer. Instead, it delves deep into scripture to see how prayer is presented in God’s word.

I am so excited to let you know that I am finally down the homes stretch of the publication and release of the book I wrote on prayer. I turned in the galley edits to my publisher last week, so now it’s just a matter of time until I announce that it is released!

What are galley edits? That is the last step in editing a book. It’s when the publisher sends the author a digital copy of the formatted book with each line in the document assigned a number. The author re-reads her book (for the umpteenth time) and notes any additional edits she may desire by listing the line number and the suggested edit in a separate document that she sends back to the editor / publisher.

This book is my Opus. It took four years to write and longer than that to get published. As an unpublished manuscript it was named one of only 25 finalists out of over 750 entries in the 2011 “Women of Faith” manuscript national competition. And very soon it will be available for purchase on Amazon. I will keep you posted! J

Cover Reveal!

Drum roll please ...

... and here it is! The long awaited cover reveal for my upcoming book. The book should be released within a few weeks by Pix-N-Pens Publishing. Stay tuned.

A Fresh Start

Today is the first day of the rest of our lives! And it’s the first day of a new year too.

Happy New Year!

As I look back at 2015 and forward to 2016, I realize how much I have to be thankful for. In my writing life, 2015 brought the publication of my first book and a publishing contract on my second book. That book should be released soon. Hopefully, I will be making a cover reveal and book announcement in the near future.

I also made many new writing friends within my publishing group, among a blog to which I have been asked to contribute Writing Prompts and Ideas ... Oh My!, in my new association with ACFW (American Christian Fiction Writers) and at conferences I have attended. And of course I continue to treasure the other writer friends I have met in the past few years.

I am excited about 2016. There is much happening in my writing life. I continue to freelance devotions and articles and have many already contracted for publication this year—five articles will appear in SEEK Magazine (Standard Publishing), one that will appear in Now What, two devotions, so far, in The Secret Place (Judson Press), one in The Upper Room, and ten days of devotions slated to appear in Open Windows (Lifeway). My 2^nd book, “Prayer: It’s Not About You” should be released soon, and I am in the editing stages of my 3^rd book (my first fiction). I will tell you more about that book later, probably in a few months. Suffice it to say that I have fallen in love with fiction writing.

I also have some speaking engagements coming up in 2016. I will be speaking at Sweetwater Baptist Church’s women’s retreat in January on the topic of prayer. And will be speaking at the Mid-South Christian Writers Conference in March about devotional writing.

2016 … WELCOME!