What inspires a novelist to create characters, explore a setting, tell a story? For me, it’s often visual stimulus that stirs my imagination, sparks memories, and starts me spinning a tale of love and loss, loneliness and community, grace and second chances. DISCOVER Prairie Song on PINTEREST
The Oregon Trail and Prairie Song
The end of the American Civil War reopened the floodgates for humanity headed west. Men and women hungered for land and business opportunities to help them rebuild their war-torn lives and families. Wagon train companies were typically a ragtag group of pioneers–families and individuals–fleeing their past, headed for a brighter future. Or so they hoped. A captain was usually hired to …
The Quilted Heart Novellas, 3 in 1
The Quilted Heart novellas only available as individual eBooks? Not for long! January 21st, WaterBrook Multnomah will release Dandelions on the Wind, Bending Toward the Sun, and Ripples Along the Shore as a print omnibus–three novellas in one thick book. In 1999, I’d gone to St. Louis for a conference and a children’s book signing event. On a program-free afternoon, this Arizona …
Leeverites, Do You Have Them?
I didn’t write this post from my home office. I was traveling, which required that I pack for another state, a higher elevation, and cooler temperatures. Before I left home, piles of clothes, shoes, and sweatshirts lie on the bed awaiting their fate, vying for room in a suitcase already spoken for by toiletries, a blow dryer, and a makeup …
Prairie Song – In Search of a Promised Land
What would drive people from the familiar into the unknown? What would cause men to venture into a harsh wilderness, leaving their families behind? Or uprooting them? For the Israelites, it was captivity in Egypt and the hope of freedom in a Promised Land that drove them from the prison they’d known for generations. In the early 1840s, emigrants …
19th Century Mercantiles
19TH CENTURY MERCANTILES Some of my earliest memories involve shopping trips with my mother, back in the . . . well, let’s just say it was a few decades ago. She’d make a list of all the places we had to go—the hardware store for the screws and bolts my dad needed for a project; the paint store for pink …
Sinclair Sisters Fun and Yum for Book Clubs
Do the members of your book club or reading group enjoy reading series and spending time with an ensemble cast? If so, the four Sinclair Sisters of Cripple Creek Series might be a great fit. And I’m happy to say the 1890s Colorado mining camp series lends itself well to having fun with Victorian, Old West, Mining Camp flair. Your group might want a …
In the Case of Sisters . . .
Then God created sisters. And He blessed me with three. I write. So it’s pretty easy to figure how what I’m wheeling around in my brown rolling case. A laptop computer, an AlphaSmart, and a USB cord. For Sis Cindy, it’s either a tea set or painting supplies. For Sis Tammy, it would be an otoscope and an audiometer since …
Donkey Derby Days
During my first research trip to Cripple Creek, Colorado, I met a couple of the town’s beloved residents–two donkeys that are a part of a herd of about a dozen that roam the city’s streets. When miners had to leave the area, often their donkeys were let loose. The several donkeys that roam the streets are believed to be descendants of those used …
Castes of Yellow
Where do novelists find a title for a work of fiction? Anywhere, and everywhere. For Maren Jensen’s story, I drew inspiration for my book title from a favorite poem, Castes of Yellow by Viola Jacobson Berg. Mrs. Berg’s two books on poetic forms–Pathways for the Poet and Poet’s Treasury: Second Book of All New Patterns have served as resources I used to teach myself how to …