Another story in a Chicken Soup Book!

I got word a couple of weeks ago that another story I wrote will be included in an upcoming “Chicken Soup for the Soul” book. This one will be in their book titled, “I Can’t Stop Laughing”. I don’t know when it will come out but will let people know when it does. This will be the fourth Chicken Soup book in a year to include one of my stories. The picture is of one of the other three that came out earlier this year. I do not have a pic of the cover of the new one. I’ve had stories in a book they released in winter ‘25, summer ‘25, autumn ‘25, and now this one that I think will come out spring of ‘26. This is my third story to be included in one of their humorous books. I never saw myself as a humor writer, so this is fun! My life has certainly had its funny moments and I’m glad I’ve learned to laugh at them. 

Looking Forward ... And Back

Welcome 2019! Today is the first day of a brand-new year. We have 364 more days ahead of us to live, laugh, love, and maybe cry a little before this year is behind us. As I think about the days to come, I can't help but also look back.

2018 was a mostly good year. I had some not-so-wonderful moments both personally and professionally but many more wonderful ones that far out-weighed the less than wonderful days. This blog is focused on my writing journey so that is what I will talk about today as I let you know some of the highlights of 2018 and things to look forward to in 2019.

2018 was another good year for freelancing. I had numerous articles published in an assortment of magazines and sites and even taught a workshop on freelance writing in June at the Kentucky Christian Writers Conference. One highlight was getting my first acceptance in a regional magazine for an article that will not come out until late summer '19.

On the book front, 2018 saw the release of one book and re-release of another, both by PixNPens. The most recent release, Prayer Warrior Confessions is an anthology compiled (and partly written) by Shirley Crowder and me. It has been received well by readers, has just finished a blog tour, and is garnering many great reviews. Another book that has been quite successful this past year is Prayer: It's Not About You. This book remains my best-selling book, actually, partly because groups of 10 or more often buy it for group Bible studies. Last August, a men's small group studied it and the leader emailed and told me he intended to teach it in a Sunday School class he leads this spring.

What were the less-than-wonderful moments in my writing world? Well, I did receive a few rejections of submitted articles (which is the norm for freelancers but stings just the same) and I learned that SEEK magazine will be folding. It has published so many of my articles. Also, my husband and I had a couple of disappointments with large traditional publishing companies who gave us every indication they were going to publish our book, "A Stand for Truth" but in the end, they did not. One actually sent a contract but it differed greatly from what we had discussed with them and was not a contract we could sign.

So, I start 2019 with much hope and great expectancy. Here is what I know already about my writing journey in the year ahead:

Freelancing:
I will be receiving contracts from both Focus on the Family and David C. Cook in January for articles to be published sometime in the coming year. I still have articles coming out in SEEK in Jan, Feb, April, and May before they close their door in August. And I know of other articles I wrote coming out in May in Purpose Magazine and in August or September in Blueridge Country magazine and devotions in both the winter and spring issues of The Secret Place.

Books:
My husband and I are moving ahead with the publishing of A Stand for Truth with the help of Gregg Bridgeman at Olivia Kimbrell Press (the press that worked with me on my novel, The Whisper of the Palms) We do not yet have a release date for A Stand for Truth. And speaking of my novel, it will be featured in a friend's blog in mid February and will go on sale at that time too.

My co-writer on many of my books, Shirley Crowder, and I have been and will stay quite busy again this year. We are in the process of writing the Glimpses of God series of devotional books; four in total--winter, spring, summer, and fall. We have winter all done and turned into our publisher. It will release next fall. (It will keep us busy in the summer when it hits the publisher's editing schedule.) We are putting the final touches on the spring book and hope to have that to our publisher in February and are just starting on the summer one which has a deadline of next August. So, while it may be winter outside, my thoughts for the next few months will be filled with summertime!

The Kentycky Writers Confernece

The Kentucky Christian Writers Conference is just two weeks away!

I love this conference. It is the first writers conference I ever attended and the one that gave me the tools to set out on my writing journey. At my first meeting, in June of 2009, I took a workshop on freelancing small pieces such as articles, devotions, short stories, etc. I came home inspired and hopeful with new information as to how to go about doing it. I sent my first submission in July of 2009, and received my first paying contract (for an article) in November of the same year.

I now have several hundred published short pieces and will be teaching the workshop on it this year! I would love to have you join me. You can get more information about it at this link: KCWC

Hope to see you there!

Lessons from the Trail--Part 2

By 2010, the writer in me had come alive. I don’t know if writing was something that lay dormant and finally hatched, a treasure God buried deep inside of me that He finally revealed, or if it was born a fresh, but whatever the case, it had become alive and active by this time. And I had found an outlet for my writing in freelancing small pieces which I began doing regularly.

 

The serendipity? I had a growing list of writing credits, some cash coming in from articles and devotions, and a slowly growing platform. But I still saw no hope of ever securing a book contract for my manuscript. So it sat on the shelf, in the forms of a hand-written notebook and a word document on my computer.

 

In the spring of 2011, I saw a contest for unpublished manuscripts and entered mine. It was the 2011 “Women of Faith” contest. Out of over 750 entries, mine was named as one of only 30 finalists. However it was not the winner and the winner received a book contract. So, other than giving me a sense of accomplishment, it did not change my reality. My manuscript was still on the shelf.

 

Last spring I attended a writer’s conference for children’s writers, even though I do not write for children. I attended to help my sister, a budding children’s writer, get her feet into the writing waters. At the conference I met Tracy Ruckman, owner of Write Integrity Press and Pix-N-Pens Press, Tracy publishes children’s books as well as all sorts of other genres. Though we had not met in person before, I knew her already via the web, because I had submitted a story to her, which she used in one of her anthologies.

 

As we talked, she asked about my writing and then asked me to send the first three chapters of my manuscript. A few weeks later, she asked for the entire manuscript and then to my incredible joy, said she wanted to publish it under PixNPens, the nonfiction side of her company.

 

So today, I am able to enjoy all kinds of writing. On the freelancing side, I now have over a hundred and fifty published pieces. (I’d have to stop and count but I know I have 100 published devotions, give or take a few, and probably close to 50 articles and stories.) I speak to women’s groups, and lead workshops at writing conferences on freelancing and devotional writing. I have two books coming out this fall, “Prayer, It’s Not About You” and “Glimpses of the Savior”, a seasonal devotional I co-wrote with childhood friend, Shirley Crowder. And I am 40,000+ words into my first novel.

 

God has been good to me!