Inspired by Life ... and Fiction

Novelists bound by the pen, sisterhood, & more

What I’m Reading. What About You?

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For the last week or so, I’ve been reading a print-out of my next novel (A Winter by the Sea, December 2023) and making LOTS of changes as I go. I catch so many more errors/repeated words/unnecessary words when reading a paper copy than when reading on screen. (If you are a writer, have you had the same experience?) Now I’m inputting all those many corrections into the Word file. As … [Read more...]

An Extra Special “Garage Sale”

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I have a beautiful new palm tree in our dining room, thanks to my friend Barbara. She needed to get the plant out of their living room to make room for some medical equipment, and knowing how much I love houseplants, Barbara thought of me. Ken loaded the palm tree up for me, and I am so honored to adopt it. Barbara's husband is going through some health struggles, so I am using this tree as a … [Read more...]

How My Cover Came to Be

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When it came time to design Memory Lane's cover, I knew two things. Courtney is a terrific author. She also owns and runs a childrens' theater with her husband. She also happens to be very gifted at cover design. AND she's one of my closest friends. :) Courtney designed the cover for my Christmas novella You and Me. Collaborating on that cover with her was fun and easy and I was very happy … [Read more...]

The Story Behind the Story

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In April I have a novella releasing in a new collection Across the Shores. But the germ of this story came to me years ago. I was trying to find the original proposal idea and I'm going to guess it was about 2011 or 2012. I'd written two series of WWII novels for Barbour -- Cornhusker Dreams set in Nebraska and the Ohio Brides set in Ohio. Stars in the Night was about to release, and Shadowed by … [Read more...]

Kept In Suspense

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Hi friends and happy Wednesday! I always look forward to my days spent withyou. I love reading a good mystery and I love writing romantic suspense because itcombines two things I adore—the twists and turns of a thriller and the happy-ever-after of a romance. I love reading and writing both, but in real life, I don’tknow about you, but I’m not the biggest fan of suspense. To be brutally honest,I … [Read more...]

2023 Bloom Conference at Harding University

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Exactly 40 years ago this spring in 1983, I graduated from Harding University in Searcy, Arkansas, which made speaking at this year's Bloom Conference this past weekend even more special. Talk about a come-full-circle moment. Author Serena Miller and I co-keynoted together and it was such a pleasure to meet her. Here are some glimpses from a very busy, but fun weekend . . . It was a … [Read more...]

The Food Forest, part 2

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The "food forest" is in a hiatus--the clean up is done (and the jungle now looks amazing, with new mulched paths running through it), but I'm waiting on the garden design and then the installation of some more plants. In the interim, however, I've decided to install some raised garden beds to grow veggies and flowers. I'm putting them inside rabbit fencing (we have dozens of wild bunnies), … [Read more...]

Anticipation

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As a child, I used to wake my mom up about hourly as Christmas Eve turned to Christmas morning. “Is it time yet? Is it time yet?” Anticipation! I didn’t grow out of it. Unbelievably, I gave birth to two daughters who were quite content to sleep until a reasonable hour, even on Christmas Day. Do you know what I did as a young mom? Starting about 2:00 or 3:00 AM, I would be up, closing … [Read more...]

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