 |
| Dawn Crandall |
Don’t ask me how. Only God knows. He made it happen… because I can honestly tell you that if I tried to do anything else in the entire world that took such concentration, focused energy and mental organization, it would NEVER happen. And this crazy book writing thing, it’s actually happened three times now. I’m amazed every single time. I can never seem to do the same thing twice the same way… and that goes for writing books too. So far, I’ve done it completely differently each time. I can say that I do try to plot the books out ahead of time first though.
For the most part, I simply collect a bunch of characters, plot situations and conflicts… and somehow they all find their order and become a finished manuscript. It might be that I’m just too distracted by what I’m doing to pay attention to how. I don’t really know. All I do know is that when I wrote The Hesitant Heiress, The Bound Heart and The Captive Imposter. I was completely in the story worlds, in the character of my heroines, and seeing everything from every direction, as well as only from their first person perspectives. I would delve in for giant chunks of time—like for 8-10 hours straight on writing days—and I had tons of fun doing it.
Yeah, so last summer when I was in the midst of hearing some pretty encouraging things from my publisher regarding the three book contract…I finally got pregnant. After seven years of trying. That was longer than I’d been writing, and the main reason I’d started writing in the first place. I’d needed something to do, something to think about besides not having babies. And so, you know—because God “makes everything work together for the good of those who love Him”—having a long wished for baby at the same time as a book contract sounded just PERFECT.
Okay, maybe not. But I have to believe that it’s happened like this for a reason. Is it that God knew I would likely never end up writing a book after I had children since I have ADD? That had been my plan ever since high school. I would marry after college (ha!), have babies right away, and then write books when they went off to school. And I know LOTS of writers (now) who have done just that! But not me!
So, now I have a four month old baby boy and my debut novel is released August 1st! I have a six week blog tour going on through the end of July and all of August, the second (less intense) launch for book #2 in November and then another for book #3 in February! At the beginning of this year, right after I’d signed my book contract, and I was six months pregnant, I didn’t make New Year’s resolutions. Instead, I picked a word for the year, a word I was going to focus on every day. The word TRUST. Because I had to trust that God knew what He was doing when I prepared for what would easily be the busiest year of my life.
Having my books published is a strange thing—especially when my main goal in writing them was for the pure enjoyment of creating something for myself. There are so many questions I still have unanswered, a ton of ways I still need to trust God, especially since all three of the books I’ve written will have been published by this time next year… and I have no idea when I’m supposed to find the time to write for 8-10 hours on any day in the near future.
But I will TRUST the God who has made my days, He who has ordained this most crazy year of my life. He knows what He is doing! And hasn’t He taken me thus far, sadly, on what little faith I’ve had?
Click to Tweet
But I will TRUST the God who has made my days. Click to Tweet.
But I have to believe that it’s happened like this for a reason. Click to Tweet.
 |
| About the Author |
After being unjustly expelled from the Boston Conservatory of Music, Amaryllis Brigham sees her dreams of founding a music academy disappearing before her very eyes. Now the only way to achieve her goal comes with high stakes for someone set on avoiding men as much as possible: marry within the year to inherit her grandmother’s fortune. Amaryllis reluctantly takes part in her aunt’s society,
 |
| The Hesitant Heiress by Dawn Crandall |
Despite her own misgivings, she soon finds herself falling in love with the most unlikely of men, Nathan Everstone, whose father not only had a part in her expulsion, but whose ominous presence has haunted her dreams for a decade since her mother’s tragic death. Nathan turns out to be much more than he seems and everything she never knew she wanted. But just as everything Amaryllis has recently hoped for comes to fruition, it all falls apart when she finds that the real culprit who has been managing her life isn't who she thought at all.
About Dawn Crandall
A graduate of Taylor University with a degree in Christian Education, and a former bookseller at Barnes & Noble, Dawn Crandall didn’t begin writing until 2010 when her husband found out about her long-buried dream of writing a book. Without a doubt about someday becoming published, he let her quit her job in 2010 in order to focus on writing The Hesitant Heiress. It didn’t take her long to realize that writing books was what she was made to do. Dawn is represented by Joyce Hart of Hartline Literary.
Apart from writing books, Dawn is also a first-time mom to a precious little boy (born March 2014) and also serves with her husband in a premarriage mentor program at their local church in Fort Wayne, Indiana.
Dawn is a member of the American Christian Fiction Writers, secretary for the Indiana ACFW Chapter (Hoosier Ink), and associate member of the Great Lakes ACFW Chapter.
The Everstone Chronicles is Dawn’s first series with Whitaker House. All three books composing the series were semifinalists in ACFW’s prestigious Genesis Writing Contest, the third book going on to become a finalist in 2013.
CONNECT WITH DAWN
Facebook: facebook.com/DawnCrandallWritesFirst
Book Review Blog: APassionforPages.blogspot.com
GoodReads: www.goodreads.com/dawn_crandall
Pinterest: www.pinterest.com/dawnwritesfirst
Email: dawncrandallwritesfirst@gmail.com
Twitter: @dawnwritesfirst
