When You Kick the Devil, You Better Be Wearing Your Armor by C. Kevin Thompson

C. Kevin Thompson

(Please read 1 Samuel 28.)

In the mid-’90s, I pastored a small church in Des Moines, Iowa. When we moved there, images of “The Heartland” came to mind. Cornfields lined the roads as we neared the city. Stories of commitment to family, country, and honor were regaled. It was where the true America lived.

One December, our daughter came home with a letter from the principal of her elementary school informing us of an upcoming Winter Festival. When I inquired about the nature of the festival and my willingness to donate time and resources, if needed, I was told that because of our ever-increasingly diverse population, symbols denoting the season—in this case, Christmas, Hanukkah, etc.—were not allowed per board policy.

That’s when my gloves came off.

We had just celebrated Halloween less than two months earlier. There didn’t seem to be a problem with displaying images of witches, ghosts, the Devil, black cats, and the other usual suspects of the holiday for that “festival.”

So, I brought some things to the attention of the principal. As it turned out, she felt the same way I did, but she was duty-bound by board policy. And now being an administrator myself, I get it. It wasn’t that I was offended. It wasn’t that I wanted the school to be isolationists and only display “my colors.” It was about equal air time and understanding that there are forces out there beyond the scope and sequence of educational standards that look for any opportunity to pollute the minds of our young people without ever giving the other side the same opportunities to educate, celebrate, and enrich. I know the power of God’s Word. I know the power of the Holy Spirit. I know the power of the Blood of Christ and the forgiveness of sins.

And that’s just it. So does the Enemy.

So, I went to work. I told the principal that I felt compelled to write an article about the issue. She encouraged me to do so. I figured it would go one of three ways: DOOR #1: They’d allow all symbols and stories; DOOR #2: They’d ban all symbols and stories; or DOOR #3: They’d keep it the way it was: “Yes” to Halloween, “No” to Christmas, Hanukkah, etc.

I wrote the article, never really expecting The Des Moines Register to publish it. Well, they proved me wrong. I wrote about the nature of Halloween, how it’s a high holy day for many people. Wiccans, Satanists, and other like-minded people hold that evening of October 31 as the most sacred and powerful day of the year, some of them praying for the destruction of Christians and Jews, others praying for a world free from a reign of God Almighty so they can “worship” as they wish. Then I turned the discussion toward the unfair practice in the schools wherein this particular religious holiday gets to be celebrated in our schools while other high holy days, like Easter and Christmas, get shunned for purposes of separation of church and state.

I called for the school board to revisit its policy.

The article appeared in a Sunday edition of the paper. That next week, I received emails and phone calls to the church from all over the U.S. It seemed I had stirred up a hornets’ nest by linking Wiccans and Satanists to the same holiday and lumping them all together. I was asked to hold a debate at a “church” in North Carolina against a noted Wiccan leader. I guess Wiccans and Satanists do not like to be recognized as worshippers of the same god.

The next week, in the Letters to the Editor section, the back page of the front section was literally filled with angry celebrants of Satan’s most holy day, calling for me to recant. In that Sunday’s paper, in the same section where my article appeared one week prior, a professor from the University of Iowa explained how she became a witch and tried dearly to argue that Satanists and Wiccans are not to be linked in any way.

What she and myriad other respondents failed to grasp, however, was that they were proving my point. What was touted by the everyday, working American family as a harmless holiday filled with harmless images of witches, ghosts, skeletons, monsters, and spider webs for the purpose of handing out not-so-harmless candy turned out to be something entirely different to an otherwise hidden substrata of the population.

Their numbers staggered even the principal who had urged me in the beginning to “write something.”

The editor of the paper, in an effort to stave off a threatened lawsuit by the debater’s church in North Carolina, asked me to write an apology. I agreed on one condition: “That you print exactly what I write, no editing allowed.” He agreed. So, I proceeded to apologize if I offended anyone who felt lumped together (for that was not my intention at all – to denigrate anyone’s beliefs), but I then proceeded to explain that the mentioning of the two as being “cousins of sorts” cannot, from my Christian worldview, be totally separated. Then, I went on to quote Deuteronomy 18:9-13 as the basis for my beliefs.

The editor and the paper got lambasted for allowing me to write my “unapologetic apology.”

C’est la vie. Truth is truth.

For those of you who don’t believe in witches, don’t believe people can conjure up dead spirits, and the like, you might want to read 1 Samuel 28. Saul believed in it. So much so, that he originally expelled all the mediums and spiritists from the land of Israel (v. 3).

However, Saul became desperate. God was no longer speaking to him. Saul tried to communicate with God—dreams, Urim, prophets (v. 6), but God remained silent.

Now, here’s the rub. Saul knew why God had abandoned him. Samuel told Saul the reason when he was alive in 1 Samuel 15. It was out of that conversation that we get the marvelous quote in 1 Samuel 15:22: “Does not the Lord delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices as much as in obeying the voice of the Lord? To obey is better than sacrifice, and to heed is better than the fat of rams.”

That was the crux of the issue.

Saul had disobeyed God. And Saul acknowledged his sin in 1 Samuel 15:24. However, what was done was done. God would not relent. So, here we are in chapter 28, and what do we find Saul doing? Using a witch to bring Samuel back from the dead.

What I love about this scene is how in the midst of evil, Samuel speaks the truth, reiterating to Saul why God has forsaken him (v. 17). Samuel also predicted Saul’s death and the death of his sons. That was scheduled to take place the next day.

Man, I bet Saul wished at that moment he hadn’t summoned Samuel. Bummer. It explains Saul’s lack of appetite toward the end of the chapter.

As a writer, do you stand amidst the evil around you and speak the truth? You know, evil comes in all shapes and sizes. Some forms worse than others, but evil nevertheless. When you are confronted with it, what do you do?

I believe that as the days grow darker, our lights will shine brighter. That’s what I believe Jesus meant when he said to set your light in the places of darkness in Matthew 5. Who lights a lamp in a room where the sun shines in? Like a city on a hill, who needs it “lit up” in the midday? But if it is illuminated in the darkness, it looks magnificent. Our lights must confront the darkness. Our lives must glorify God. And as is often the case, light exposes darkness. Especially this time of year when the world is dressing up, like the Celtics of old did to worship Samhain and ward off evil spirits.

We shouldn’t turn to darkness to seek the light either. That’s what desperate people who know not God do. That’s what Saul did, and you see how well that worked out for him.

Oh, and by the way, the school board of Des Moines chose Door #2. Was it the door I wanted? No. But at least Satan and his cronies got flushed out of the darkness and their holiday treated like all others.

I consider that a victory in this enemy territory we live in (Ephesians 6:10-20).

As a writer, do you stand amidst the evil around you and speak the truth? #seriouslywrite #encouragementforwriters via @CKevinThompson

I wrote the article, never really expecting The Des Moines Register to publish it. That next week, I received emails and phone calls to the church from all over the U.S. #seriouslywrite #encouragementforwriters via @CKevinThompson

It seemed I had stirred up a hornets’ nest by linking Wiccans and Satanists to the same holiday and lumping them all together. I was asked to hold a debate at a “church” in North Carolina against a noted Wiccan leader. #seriouslywrite #encouragementforwriters via @CKevinThompson

Triple Time

Triple Time

Book 2 of The Blake Meyer Thriller Series

A Looming Attack. A Loathsome Abduction. A Lethal Assassin.

Supervisory Special Agent Blake Meyer has an impossible choice to make. After thwarting a massive biological attack on the continental United States, the contagion is still missing and in the hands of the enemy. So is his family. Abducted as an act of revenge.

The clock is ticking, and the chances of finding his wife and children wane with every passing second. The assassin behind it holds all the answers.

Or does she?

Three demands. Three choices.

Blake Meyer knows what must be done...but can he accomplish it before it’s too late? Time is literally of the essence. And double time will not be fast enough.



C. KEVIN THOMPSON is a husband, a father, a grandfather, and a kid at heart. Often referred to as “crazy” by his grandchildren, it’s only because he is. He’s a writer. Need he say more?

The second edition of his award-winning debut novel, The Serpent’s Grasp, is now available! The first four books of his Blake Meyer Thriller series are out as well. Book 1, 30 Days Hath Revenge, Book 2, Triple Time, Book 3, The Tide of Times, and Book 4, When the Clock Strikes Fourteen, are now available! Book 5, A Pulse of Time, is coming soon! And, his new standalone novel, The Letters, is due out January 7, 2020 in e-book, February 18, 2020 in paperback! It is a “Christmas Carol-esque” book that will haunt your family pleasantly for years to come!

Kevin is a huge fan of the TV series 24, The Blacklist, Blue Bloods, NCIS, Criminal Minds, BBC shows Broadchurch, Shetland, Hinterland, and Wallander, loves anything to do with Star Trek, and is a Sherlock Holmes fanatic too. But you will never catch him wearing a deerstalker. Ever.

Website: www.ckevinthompson.com/
Kevin’s Writer’s Blog: www.ckevinthompson.blogspot.com/
Facebook: C. Kevin Thompson – Author Fan Page
Twitter: @CKevinThompson
Instagram: ckevinthompson
Pinterest: ckevinthompsonauthor
Goodreads: C. Kevin Thompson
BookBub: C. Kevin Thompson

May This Blog Haunt You Pleasantly (Part 1) by C. Kevin Thompson

C. Kevin Thompson

One of the things all authors do regularly is read about the craft. How to write, what to write, what makes exceptional writing, what doesn’t…all the nuances, opinions, debates, professional advice, and sometimes contradictory “rules” out there can make a writer’s head swim.

Especially if you’re a new author.

I am convinced, however, that if new writers wish to “get their minds right,” they should be reading about famous authors, for it may be just as important, if not more so, than reading what other authors have written—especially when seeking insight into “how” stories come to be.

I did just this very exercise over the holidays, reading Les Standiford’s The Man Who Invented Christmas: How Charles Dickens’s A Christmas Carol Rescued His Career and Revived Our Holiday Spirits. There were a few things I pulled from the pages that have inspired me. In the next three months, I will bring three major “gleanings,” if you will, that arose from those pages and have relevance for us all.

Gleaning #1: Authors have always wished to get their works in as many readers’ hands as possible, sometimes at the chagrin of their publishers (if they are traditionally published) or themselves (if they are independently published). And if not handled properly, it can become an all-consuming fire.

Charles Dickens, when he wrote his famed “little book,” known as A Christmas Carol, he was deep in debt, as he was most of his life. Yet, he wished for the average person to be able to get their hands on the book. Publishing prices for such a book in 1843 would have easily set the cost as high as thirty-one schillings or as low as five schillings for a seasonably red, hardcover copy with engravings done up in color and the pages edged in gold. Five schillings was not an exorbitant amount of money for the wealthier of the middle class, but definitely more than a worker like Bob Cratchit—who had a wife and five children—could have afforded on fifteen schillings a week without giving it some great thought and budgetary planning. Dickens allowed the price to be set at five schillings a copy, knowing some would be given to libraries. He also knew five schillings was somewhat of a bargain price that could still allow him to work his way out of debt.

I liken this entire price setting episode to e-books today. Many a publisher would like to charge $7.99 and up, but we often see books offered at $3.99 and less (sometimes free!) to build an audience. Something Dickens was always striving to do. If he had one fault, it was his incessant desire to make money so he would never be in debt again. Hmm…have you ever wished that wish? It seemed to almost consume Dickens at times, making him happy when his works sold well—as in the case of Oliver Twist, for example. But when his books didn’t sell well and placed him at odds with his publisher, then the pleasant Dickens became a cash-strapped worrier.

Before all of the six thousand books of the first printing were sold by Christmas Day, 1843—after being released just a few weeks before—Dickens had written to a friend, explaining how he hoped for a thousand pounds in profit to help his financial situation. And when compared to the two hundred pounds he was earning a month at the time for installments of his novel, The Life and Adventures of Martin Chuzzlewit, a thousand pounds definitely would have been a sizeable help.

But to his horror, after receiving his royalty statement from the publisher, Chapman & Hall, he wrote to his friend and agent, John Forster, on Saturday morning, Feb. 10, 1844: “Such a night as I have passed, I really believed I should never get up again, until I passed through all the horrors of a fever.”

Forster thought Dickens had some ailment. However, like so many authors, his ailment wasn’t internal. It was caused by an external force—His Publisher’s Accounting Statement:

• Started with 6,000 copies, minus approximately 103 gift, library, and press copies
• 26 copies sold at “three schillings, six pence” as a promotional deal to booksellers
• Printing: 74 pounds, 2 schillings
• Paper: 89 pounds, 2 schillings
• Drawing and Engravings: 49 pounds, 18 schillings
• Two Steel Plates: 1 pound, 4 schillings
• Printing Plates: 15 pounds, seventeen schillings
• Paper for the Plates: 7 pounds, 12 schillings
• Coloring: 120 pounds
• Binding of the books: 180 pounds
• Incidentals and Advertising: 168 pounds, 7 schillings, 8 pence
• Commission to the Publisher (@ 15%): 148 pounds, 16 schillings
• TOTAL EXPENSES: 855 pounds, 8 schillings
• BALANCE OF ACCOUNT TO MR. DICKEN’S CREDIT: 137 pounds, 4 schillings, 4 pence

As Standiford notes, “Dickens was shattered and said as much to his agent: ‘I had set my heart and soul upon a Thousand, clear. What a wonderful thing it is, that such a great success should occasion me such intolerable anxiety and disappointment.’” ¹

Few people know this, but Dickens almost quit in February of 1844. He was in debt when he began writing A Christmas Carol in October of 1843 (did you know he wrote it in six weeks and had it published before Christmas? So much for NaNoWriMo saving the financial day, eh?). ² He had also dealt with his debtor father, which is another long story that caused Dickens to spend his early childhood in a “workhouse” while he helped get his father out of debtor’s prison.

To help with his situation, Dickens had purchased a thirteen-room house on Devonshire Terrace—just around the block, by the way, from a more famous address: 221-B Baker Street—to accommodate everyone, including his father and mother. This massive house and his growing family of soon-to-be five children caused finances to be tight, indeed. As a result, he felt he might have to turn his efforts to more economically successful endeavors and abandon writing altogether.

Ever been in Dickens’s shoes? Is the writing life just as “paycheck to paycheck” as the next job? Yep. Can be. For most authors, it is.

Ever been told “back in the day, publishers picked up all the advertising costs”? Now we know, that is a lie. Even with the great Charles Dickens, publishers deducted the costs of doing business from the sales. His own disappointing bottom line caused him to eventually sign a contract with a new publisher on June 1, 1844. He received an advance of 2,800 pounds to get him through a furlough from writing and a trip abroad to garner new ideas. This amount would be paid back during the life of the eight-year contract.

Ever had your heart set on a certain bottom line only to see a fraction of that amount fill out the little box on the royalty check? Did that make you want to quit? Chase more lucrative endeavors to pay the bills?

Dickens was only thirty-two years old in February of 1844. Even with great “hits” to his credit, like The Pickwick Papers, The Adventures of Oliver Twist, The Life and Adventures of Nicolas Nickleby, and The Old Curiosity Shop, one of history’s greatest writers was one step away from throwing away his pen and paper…for good.

Aren’t you glad Dickens chose to tough it out? Otherwise, works like these would not have been completed or written at all: Martin Chuzzlewit, The Chimes, The Cricket on the Hearth, The Battle of Life, Dombey and Son, The Haunted Man and the Ghost’s Bargain, David Copperfield, Bleak House, Hard Times: For These Times, Little Dorrit, A Tale of Two Cities, Great Expectations, Our Mutual Friend, The Mystery of Edwin Drood, Boots at the Holly Tree Inn, Reprinted Pieces, and The Mudfrog Papers.

As you can see, much of what Dickens endured in the mid-1800s wasn’t much different than today’s market. Publishers have bottom lines. Writers have hopes and dreams. And usually, a writer’s dreams and hopes are larger than the “Balance of the Account to Your Credit.”

The monetary cost of publication (and some would say the emotional cost as well) will always be a thorn in the writer’s side. Writers will always have a need (usually a financial one) to write more, especially if they are full-time authors. It has always been this way, apparently. And by the looks of it, always will.

So, are you in? For the long haul? Like Dickens? Regardless of the bottom lines?

I hope so.

Stay tuned for next month’s “Part 2,” where we will look at the publisher/author relationship through the lens of Charles Dickens.

¹ Standiford, Les. The Man Who Invented Christmas: How Charles Dickens’s A Christmas Carol Rescued His Career and Revived Our Holiday Spirits. Broadway Books; New York, NY, 2017. pp. 153-157.

² Although, some would argue that Dickens wrote his best work in A Christmas Carol, so maybe there’s something to be said for writing fast after all. 😊

Triple Time 

Triple Time

Book 2 of The Blake Meyer Thriller Series

A Looming Attack. A Loathsome Abduction. A Lethal Assassin.

Supervisory Special Agent Blake Meyer has an impossible choice to make. After thwarting a massive biological attack on the continental United States, the contagion is still missing and in the hands of the enemy. So is his family. Abducted as an act of revenge.

The clock is ticking, and the chances of finding his wife and children wane with every passing second. The assassin behind it holds all the answers.

Or does she?

Three demands. Three choices.

Blake Meyer knows what must be done...but can he accomplish it before it’s too late? Time is literally of the essence. And double time will not be fast enough.

C. KEVIN THOMPSON is a husband, a father, a grandfather, and a kid at heart. Often referred to as “crazy” by his grandchildren, it’s only because he is. He’s a writer. Need he say more?

The first three books of his Blake Meyer Thriller series are out! Book 1, 30 Days Hath Revenge, Book 2, Triple Time, and Book 3, The Tide of Times, are now available! Book 4, When the Clock Strikes Fourteen, is getting closer! Also, the second edition of his award-winning debut novel, The Serpent’s Grasp, is now available!

Kevin is a huge fan of the TV series 24, The Blacklist, Blue Bloods, and Criminal Minds, loves anything to do with Star Trek, and is a Sherlock Holmes fanatic, too. It’s quite elementary, actually.

Website: www.ckevinthompson.com/

Kevin’s Writer’s Blog: www.ckevinthompson.blogspot.com/

Facebook: C. Kevin Thompson – Author Fan Page

Twitter: @CKevinThompson

Goodreads: C. Kevin Thompson
BookBub: C. Kevin Thompson

The Dark Side of Writing by C. Kevin Thompson

C. Kevin Thompson

“All I want to do is write.”

“If I could just get a book published, then I’d be on my way.”

Ever uttered these words? Or similar phrases?

As a writer, when we delve into art of putting words down on a page, we tend to view life through the lens of the right side of the brain. That’s where art occurs. Creative juices flow like a river from that half. Flowers bloom. Butterflies flutter by. The wind snakes its way through the tree tops. The world is our canvas.

To a writer, evil lives within the left hemisphere. That’s where the horrors of math and science and logic lie. Creativeness can never coexist with these plagues of humanity. They are diametrically opposed in every way. Some non-fiction writers seem to think the two can be blended together, but the novelist scoffs at such naiveté.

Then, one day, the writer becomes a published author. The goal of “all I ever wish to do is write” seems well within his or her grasp now. Left-brained people send this author a thing called a contract. It is some legal agreement to satisfy the ones who have succumbed to the dark side. All they see is numbers, profit margins, and marketability. The author views these things as roadblocks to creative freedom. A necessary evil.

It’s not long before the now published author is asked to market said book. “These left-brained hucksters are simply trying to build their empires. All I want to do is write! That pure, innocent act of placing words in a select order to cause my kindred, right-brained spirits to jump for joy at the sheer awesomeness of my imagination.”

However, the shadowy secret of the dark side has been lurking all around the author. It’s been crouched in the branches of the beautiful trees the author paints with his/her “wordbrush.”It’s been swimming under the surface of the rhetorical river pieced together by the author’s prose. The left-brained have kept it hidden. They obscured the author’s view. They waited until the right time, when the right-brained author was at his/her weakest, most vulnerable point. They waited until the author was sitting in front of a contract. The pen of publication, like a tractor beam, snagged the author’s hand, dragging him/her into the fold without a whimper.

Before the author knew it, he/she was partnered with people who are more concerned with numbers, profit margins, and marketability.

Now, fully embroiled in this thing called a publishing relationship, the wretched, left-brained lowlifes placed further demands on the author. Facebook author pages must be created. Twitter accounts need to be launched. Instagram, Pinterest, Snapchat, Hootsuite…to the author, the words of left-brained sound like the languages spoken in a bar on Tatooine.

The author feels like he/she has been sucked into a vortex—The black hole of business. All that awaits is the face-to-face meeting with the Emperor himself, informing the author he feels the author’s anger.

And we all know where anger leads, don’t we? Pain. The pain of sending out tweets and being a member of LinkedIn. Then comes the suffering. The author buying his/her own Facebook ads. Traveling a hundred miles away from home to sign books for people he/she doesn’t know. Telling novice authors who don’t market their books that he/she “finds their lack of faith disturbing.”

It’s then, in that moment, when the author realizes he/she has succumbed to the dark side of writing. The author is now a small business owner.

It’s inevitable, my right-brained friend. Don’t fight it. Embrace the left brain.Otherwise, end up on Dagobah, living in a hut, all by yourself, you will. Hmmm?

Triple Time

Triple Time

Book 2 of The Blake Meyer Thriller Series

A Looming Attack. A Loathsome Abduction. A Lethal Assassin.

Supervisory Special Agent Blake Meyer has an impossible choice to make. After thwarting a massive biological attack on the continental United States, the contagion is still missing and in the hands of the enemy. So is his family. Abducted as an act of revenge.

The clock is ticking, and the chances of finding his wife and children wane with every passing second. The assassin behind it holds all the answers.

Or does she?

Three demands. Three choices.

Blake Meyer knows what must be done...but can he accomplish it before it’s too late? Time is literally of the essence. And double time will not be fast enough.

C. KEVIN THOMPSON is an ordained minister with a B.A. In Bible (Houghton College, Houghton, NY), an M.A. in Christian Studies (Wesley Biblical Seminary, Jackson, MS), and an M.Ed. in Educational Leadership (National-Louis University, Wheeling, IL). He presently works as an assistant principal in a middle school.

His latest book, 30 Days Hath Revenge - A Blake Meyer Thriller: Book 1, is now available! Book 2 of the Blake Meyer Series, Triple Time, is now available! Book 3, The Tide of Times, will be out in August 2017! Also, the second edition of The Serpent’s Grasp will be out in May 2017 through Hallway Publishing!

Kevin is a huge fan of the TV series 24, The Blacklist, Blue Bloods, and Criminal Minds, loves anything to do with Star Trek, and is a Sherlock Holmes fanatic, too.

To connect with Kevin and learn more, please visit:

Website:                                www.ckevinthompson.com/

Kevin’s Writer’s Blog:        www.ckevinthompson.blogspot.com/

Facebook:                              C. Kevin Thompson – Author Fan Page

Twitter:                                 @CKevinThompson 

Goodreads:                           C. Kevin Thompson

Where Imagination Meets Eternity by C. Kevin Thompson

C. Kevin Thompson

I recently came across two articles that spoke to different topics but had a similar message.

One article, from Mirror, in the UK, tells the tale of how a female author by the name of Enid Blyton apparently held a contest back in the day. The winner received a copy of George Elliot’s book, Silas Marner, with an inscription from Blyton congratulating the winner named Mary. The book was then acquired years later via some kind of estate sale by a bookstore in the UK and put on the shelves for one pound (£1). Someone bought the book, took it home, and found the famous author’s signature and note inside, instantly making the book worth several hundred pounds, much to the lament of the used bookstore owner.

The other article was about a Canadian pharmacist by the name of Dr. William Leslie who traveled to central Africa, spending 17 years of his life attempting to evangelize the region. He eventually left Africa believing his mission was a wretched failure. Now, 72 years later, what has developed into a thriving Christian community is nothing short of miraculous.

As writers, we often feel like Dr. Leslie, don’t we? We write stories. We write articles. We blog. We Facebook. We Twitter. We “pin” things of interest on Pinterest. We write more stories and articles, all the while seeing our work go largely unnoticed. It seems to “get noticed” in the exploding, noisy world of publishing requires something miraculous. It takes a great deal of faith and hope to keep after this writing deal we love so much when nothing miraculous is happening.

But who’s to say that one day, a book you signed for a reader or contest winner won’t be worth more than all your books combined? Or who’s to say a flourishing community of fans over the years won’t sprout up in little pockets, little dots on the globe, where you surely believed you had never penetrated?

We often limit ourselves. It’s not that God closes the doors. It’s rather that we do. “Oh ye of little faith” (Matthew 8:26). We sang the songs as kids. “My God is so big, so strong, and so mighty, there’s nothing my God cannot do.” Yet, He has chosen NOT to use us and our writing abilities. That’s what we rationalize, anyway. Instead, we believe God’s chosen Author X or Author Y. “He’s blessing them. Look at their Amazon rankings and number of reviews!”

Could it be that they are selling tons of books but making no impact on society? I’ve never heard of Enid Blyton. She sold 600 million books (partially because she wrote about 300 million…J/K, but close). I’m sure she was an excellent author, but her books didn’t impact me, and I’m sure I’m not alone. Oh, and by the way, none of her books have been made into blockbuster movies, either. Interesting.

Yet, one author who did make an impact on me was Margaret Marshall Saunders. She didn’t write very many novels. I only counted a handful online. The one I read as a boy was Beautiful Joe. It impacted me because I was given this book shortly after our family dog passed away. The one I’d grown up with since being an infant.

I said all that to say this: You just never know who you may be impacting right now, or in the days ahead. So, keep writing. Keep getting better at it. Don’t lose hope. You just never know when somebody wanders into a used bookstore and finds your signature on the inside pages. Or maybe a reader gets inspired and does wondrous things for the kingdom of God in a remote place. Or maybe a little boy finds comfort in your words after a devastating loss.

None of these things can happen if you turn off your computer, toss your pen aside, and say, “I quit.”

Keep writing, my friend, and be faithful to God. He has plans for you (Jeremiah 29:11).

Triple Time  

Triple Time

Book 2 of The Blake Meyer Thriller Series

A Looming Attack. A Loathsome Abduction. A Lethal Assassin.

Supervisory Special Agent Blake Meyer has an impossible choice to make. After thwarting a massive biological attack on the continental United States, the contagion is still missing and in the hands of the enemy. So is his family. Abducted as an act of revenge.

The clock is ticking, and the chances of finding his wife and children wane with every passing second. The assassin behind it holds all the answers.

Or does she?

Three demands. Three choices.

Blake Meyer knows what must be done...but can he accomplish it before it’s too late? Time is literally of the essence. And double time will not be fast enough.

C. KEVIN THOMPSON is an ordained minister with a B.A. In Bible (Houghton College, Houghton, NY), an M.A. in Christian Studies (Wesley Biblical Seminary, Jackson, MS), and an M.Ed. in Educational Leadership (National-Louis University, Wheeling, IL). He presently works as an assistant principal in a middle school.

His latest book, 30 Days Hath Revenge - A Blake Meyer Thriller: Book 1, is now available! Book 2 of the Blake Meyer Series, Triple Time, is now available for pre-order! Book 3, The Tide of Times, will be out in August 2017! Also, the second edition of The Serpent’s Grasp will be out in May 2017 through Hallway Publishing!

Kevin is a huge fan of the TV series 24, The Blacklist, Blue Bloods, and Criminal Minds, loves anything to do with Star Trek, and is a Sherlock Holmes fanatic, too.

To connect with Kevin and learn more, please visit:

Website:                                www.ckevinthompson.com/

Kevin’s Writer’s Blog:        www.ckevinthompson.blogspot.com/

Facebook:                              C. Kevin Thompson – Author Fan Page

Twitter:                                 @CKevinThompson 

Goodreads:                           C. Kevin Thompson