Authorization to Print

This afternoon I received the form to sign authorizing Pleasant Word to print my book which means as soon as I sign it and send it back, my book will go to the printer!  This is the final step!  I'll probably get my first books in about three weeks.  I still can't quite imagine what that moment is going to be like, opening the box and getting to see my completed book for the first time.  I've been working on this for so long and to have just about reached the end is amazing.  In just a few weeks I will have gone from working to get my book published to trying to sell it.  I look forward to starting all the plans I have to promote it.

Being Used by God . . .

. . . it is definitely one of the most amazing experiences in life.  Turning my writing over to Him and asking Him to use me and what I write is one of the best decisions I've ever made.  It's given me wonderful experiences that, no matter how small, always fill me with awe.  Experiences like coming up with the title for Every Tear or being given the perfect line for an important part in a book when I've prayed for it.  It's amazing how God can speak to you even if you don't even realize it at first.  I am a Christian who admittedly has trouble witnessing verbally, but I feel God has given me the power to do it through writing.  I never felt I could come up with the right words to explain faith and other things to people, but many times, especially lately, I find myself reading over what I write and thinking, "Wow, I didn't know I could write something like that or explain it that way," and I know it's all coming from Him.  Now that I've begun writing Makilien which is an allegory of becoming a Christian, living a Christian life, and battling the forces of Satan, I've had so many of those wowing moments and I've only just started.  Seeing the ways God has directed me into using my fantasy stories, that once had no meaning, to paint a picture of life with and without Him is very awe-inspiring and satisfying.  One of my favorite verses is: Commit to the Lord whatever you do, and your plans will succeed. - Proverbs 16:3 NIV  I always keep that verse before me when I'm writing because when I do commit my work to God and ask Him to help me write in a way that glorifies Him, it's then that my writing is at its best and I am able to write better than I first thought I could.

About Me

In case you want to know a little bit about me and the things I like here it goes.

 

I began writing when I was eight years old. At the time I just loved the Babysitter's Little Sister series and wrote stories like that and they always had something to do with a girl and horses. I also got into The Pony Pal Club series, which I'll always remember as one of my all-time favorite book series. They greatly influenced my writing as well. The stories I wrote at that time were the last modern day stories I ever wrote. After I saw The Lord of the Rings I began to write fantasy and now I mostly write historical fiction. I always say I couldn't write a modern day book to save my life. lol

 

I'm a homeschool graduate and I still live at home with my parents and two younger brothers. I'm not a girly girl. I have a couple different styles. I'm a cowgirl at heart, I love the outdoors, I'm quiet (except when really excited, lol), and I love both being alone and spending time with good friends. I'm not a thrill-seeker, but I like a little adventure sometimes. I'm very creative, a daydreamer, and I'm hopelessly romantic. I have four lovely, precious cats and our family dog, a yellow lab named Barley.

 

I didn't used to, but now I enjoying listening to music, especially my favorite artists. My favorite band is Storyside B, a Christian rock band. I got to meet all the guys recently and was really impressed with all of them. They are a great bunch of guys. Two of my other favorite artists are, of course, Casting Crowns and Jeremy Camp. I also like to listen to Daughtry and Rascal Flatts.

 

Probably my next favorite hobbies after writing are sewing historical costumes and historical reenactment. Some other hobbies of mine are horseback riding and hiking. I've loved horses all my life and though I don't own a horse at the moment, that is one of my goals this year. I love to journal. In the winter I like to snowboard even though I'm still really terrible at it. lol I don't feel I'm very musically talented at all, but I am learning to play bass guitar and am enjoying it immensely. I love photo editing and painting on the computer with Photoshop. In the summer I love to go fishing, rafting down the river, and playing Airsoft with my brothers and cousins.

 

I love movies, especially action/adventure movies. Some of my favorites are Pirates of the Caribbean, The Lord of the Rings, Kingdom of Heaven, Gladiator, Master and Commander, The Chronicles of Narnia, and The Prince and Me. As I'm sure you can probably tell, my favorite actors are Orlando Bloom and Russell Crowe. Other than movies, I absolutely love BBC's TV show, Robin Hood. It's just as good and exciting as any movie.

 

And I am addicted to cream cheese, cheese, and chocolate.

God Has Different Plans

It seems that God wants me to put off writing my western for a while.  I'm not at all disappointed because I'm really enjoying His new plans.  This is what happened.  For a couple of days now I've been praying for a good story plan for a western novel, but instead all the ideas that kept coming to me were for an entirely different story.  Years ago when I was writing my fantasy stories, I was working on a series of five books (I completed three).  They were the typical "modern day girl ends up in a world like Middle-earth in The Lord of the Rings."  They were completely for my enjoyment and the enjoyment of my cousins who loved them and they were always very special to me because they were the first books I ever completely finished writing.  I always wished I could do something with them, but since I used everything from The Lord of the Rings, I couldn't and, I admit, they weren't that well written anyway.

 

God actually started giving me some ideas for this a month or two ago.  One morning I was thinking about my fantasy books for some reason and wondered if I could rewrite them completely using my own imagination and give them a Christian message.  It sounded fun, but at that time I was right in the middle of A Captain's Heart so I wasn't thinking about starting any other stories and I honestly thought it would be way too hard to rewrite my fantasies.  So, for the last few days, I've really been struggling to start writing again.  I hate when I don't have a book I'm working on.  Like I said, I was praying for a good western story plot, but all I kept thinking about were my fantasies and how I could change them.  Then, yesterday morning just before I got out of bed the whole thing came together for how I could rewrite them and give them a Christian message.  What I'm doing is combining my first two books into one and my last two into one so there will be two when I'm finished.  They are kind of a cross between my original stories, The Lord of the Rings, The Chronicles of Narnia, and The Pilgrim's Progress.  I'm already half done with the first chapter and it's going very well.  I think I'll be able to write it pretty quickly since I know almost exactly what is going to happen throughout the book because I'm mostly following my original storyline with a few changes.  This two book (and perhaps more, we'll see) series of mine is called Makilien, the name of the book's heroine.