Is Your Story Too Good to be True? by Gayla Hiss

Are your stories connecting with readers? If not, author Gayla Hiss may have the answer for you. -- Sandy

Gayla: You’ve written the perfect story . . . never to be published. That was how I felt early in my writing journey. I had good plot ideas, but couldn’t get any traction with publishers. Their rejection letters rarely provided specifics, so it was up to me to solve the mystery like a sleuth in a detective novel. It finally came down to one fatal flaw: my story wasn’t true to life.

In order for stories to connect with readers, they should reflect all the challenges, complications and heartache that come with being human in a fallen world. While it’s tempting to sugarcoat the conflicts and disasters and gloss over the hard realities of life, doing so diminishes the impact of our characters’ triumphs and transformations. For instance, in the Bible, the woman caught in adultery faced an execution squad of male accusers ready to stone her to death. Jesus’ intervention at her lowest point is what makes her story so compelling. The Bible has many such examples, most notably the triumph of our Lord’s glorious resurrection three days after His excruciating death on the cross. For Christians, our lowest valley is physical death, but it is in death that we summit to eternal life with Christ!

Life is complicated. We have many people in our lives: family members, coworkers, friends, neighbors, etc. And each person has their own story, dreams and goals, which sometimes clash with our own. Likewise, our stories should include a good variety of secondary characters who add color and conflict as well as provide confidants and mentors for our heroes and heroines.

Unplanned and unexpected events also occur in our lives, some good, some bad. A person may reveal they are going to have a baby—or that they have a terminal illness. These surprises can often lead us down a different path than we’d planned, or force us to reassess our dreams and beliefs. When these types of events occur in our stories, our characters are faced with the same critical choices and consequences.

By enriching our stories with real-life conflicts, we make them more authentic. If we understand and relate to our hero and heroine’s struggles, we’ll cheer their triumphs even more, because in the end their challenges and victories are really a reflection of our own.

Do your characters face everyday issues in a realistic way that helps readers relate to them and your stories?

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Gayla’s writing journey began with her hobby painting landscapes. In her imagination, characters and scenes came to life as she painted beautiful natural settings. Her inspiring novels combine her love for the great outdoors with romance, suspense and mystery. Gayla and her husband often tour the country in their RV, visiting many state and national parks. She enjoys hiking, camping, and traveling, and lives in the Pacific Northwest. She’s excited to announce the recent release of her debut novel, Avalanche, book 1 of her Peril in the Park series. Visit www.gaylakhiss.com to learn more, and connect with her on Facebook, Amazon and Goodreads.

Is Your Life Like a One-Ingredient Cake? by Zoe M. McCarthy

Zoe M. McCarthy

Do you feel like flour or baking powder—sifted?
Do you taste like vanilla or cocoa–bitter?
Do you act like pure sugar—sickly sweet?
Do you come across like oil—too slick?
Do you bear up like salt—preserved?
Do you feel like udder milk—squeezed?
Do you feel like an egg—born yesterday?

When my sister gives her testimony, she brings a story basket with all the above ingredients. She quotes Romans 8:28. And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. Then based on Randy Alcorn’s article “There Is No Pointless Suffering,” she says:

“Almost everything that goes into a cake tastes terrible. But a delicious metamorphosis takes place when these ingredients are skillfully measured and mixed then baked at the perfect temperature. The final product is good!

“Our trials and apparent tragedies taste bitter to us. However, no translation of Romans 8:28 says ‘each thing by itself is good,’ but ‘all things work together for good,’ and not on their own, but under God’s sovereign hand. Every experience God gives us is the perfect preparation for the future only He can see.”

Then my sister relates how God orchestrated her life from abuse to the other side where God gave her a new name. From victim to survivor.

Ultimately, the big question for my sister was Jesus’ question to the invalid of 38 years that He approached beside the pool at Bethesda, “Do you want to get well?” (NIV) Or, “Wilt thou be made whole?” (KJV)

Was my sister’s journey under God’s orchestration easy? No.

At three and a half, she was abused. She felt abandoned, she screamed inside, and she “exploded.” Then she felt God say, “You’ll always have a Father in heaven.”

Undergoing the abuse by a different perpetrator much of her young life, she stuffed the memories. In her twenties, she slogged through a period of depression.

Later, she began to realize the life she had lived was not the life she had believed it to be. “Denial. Self-brainwashing.”

She was in therapy for ten years. The betrayal of her perpetrator was the hardest to deal with. “One minute I’d want to explode and shatter every piece of glass to communicate what I felt, and the next I’d want to implode until there was not one cell left of me.”

God never let go of her, even when she didn’t like Him, obeyed Him only because He was more powerful than she was, and struggled to study the Bible when she didn’t want to because it brought horrifying flashbacks. God stayed with her. He spoke to her in dreams and once appeared in a powerful show of light when she was awake.

Besides the abuse, my sister had three miscarriages, and her youngest daughter is a special-needs child. In spite of her trials, she has enjoyed much success in her life, before and after therapy. She has also served in a long-term children’s ministry and ministered to other women.

My sister ends her testimony, relating her ability to forgive and making these statements:

“God didn’t just make the best of a bad situation. Rather, he intended all along to use evil for ultimate good.”

“God has a plan, the ability to carry it out, and the loving kindness to do it not only for His glory but our good.”

If you are feeling like a one-ingredient cake, listen to Jesus’ question to you. “Do you want to get well?” If yes, let Him make you whole.

Is Your Life Like a One-Ingredient Cake? Click to Tweet.

About the Author

Zoe M. McCarthy believes the little-known fact that opposites distract. Thus, she spins Christian contemporary romances entangling extreme opposites. Her tagline is: Distraction to Attraction, Magnetic Romances Between Opposites. Her first novel is Calculated Risk. She has two more contemporary romances and a nonfiction book to help writers ready their manuscripts coming out soon. She’s a member of American Christian Fiction Writers. She enjoys leading workshops on the craft of writing; speaking about her faith; planning fun events for her 5 grandchildren; and exploring the Blue Ridge Mountains, where she lives with her husband, John.
Learn more about Zoe M. McCarthy at her website: http://zoemmccarthy.com

Calculated Risk

What happens when an analytical numbers man meets a mercurial marketing Rep? Romance is a calculated risk…

Jilted by the latest of her father’s choices of “real men,” Cisney Baldwin rashly accepts an invitation to spend Thanksgiving weekend with a sympathetic colleague and his family. Nick LeCrone is a man too much her opposite to interest her and too mild-mannered to make her overbearing father’s “list.” Now, Cisney fears Nick wants to take advantage of her vulnerable state over the holiday. Boy, is she wrong.

Nick wants little to do with Cisney. She drives him crazy with all her sticky notes and quirks. He extended an invitation because he felt sorry for her. Now he’s stuck, and to make matters worse, his family thinks she’s his perfect match. He’ll do what he can to keep his distance, but there’s just one problem—he’s starting to believe Cisney’s magnetism is stronger than he can resist.

Purchase links for Calculated Risk: http://zoemmccarthy.com/books

With Many Such Parables... By Marianne Evans

Marianne Evans

With many such parables, He spoke the word to them as they were able

to understand it. ~ Mark 4:33

Know what I love? I love the truth of Jesus being a storyteller. Isn’t it an awesome image? As authors of Christ-centered books, we assume the same daunting but blessed task of the earliest disciples. We are the word-weavers, the scribes, the storytellers of our modern world. We are the keepers, and crafters, of our era’s parables.

Wow. Think about that—not in a prideful, self-righteous way, but in the context of a Christ-centered legacy. I read a devotional recently that shined a spotlight on that fact and left me thinking long and hard about applying it to my writing craft and ministry. Jesus’s favorite teaching technique was the use of short, fictional stories that illustrate a spiritual lesson or truth. He shared his mission, his ministry, through stories. Sound like a familiar occupation?

Taking a page from the lesson plan of the Great Teacher, I find myself looking at each book I create as a message. Not a sermon, nothing preachy or lofty, but something real and relatable that just might touch people’s lives and hearts. Affirm faith, as I like to say. That’s what Jesus did when he shared the Parable of the Talents, The Widow’s Mite, The Prodigal. As authors, we entertain. As authors, we illuminate by using our words, the story ideas given to us by Divine inspiration. As authors, we carry on that legacy.

May I repeat? Wow. 

Now, let’s take that a step further. What is the basic ‘teaching’ of your work? What is the theme of your writing and/or ministry as an author? What is God prompting you to share? What ways is He challenging you to move from familiar pathways and explore other avenues, whether writing or life related?

Give it some thought, and prayer, and trust the Spirit nudges and replies you receive in the silence of that meditation. God bless, friends, and write-on!! 

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Click to Tweet!

Christian authors: The crafters and keepers of modern-day parables.

Christian authors: The word-weavers and scribes of Christ's legacy.

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Marianne Evans is an award-winning author of Christian romance and fiction. Her hope is to spread the faith-affirming message of God’s love through the stories He prompts her to create. Devotion, earned the Bookseller’s Best Award as well as the Heart of Excellence Award. Hearts Communion earned a win for Best Romance from the Christian Small Publisher's Association. She is also a two-time recipient of the Selah Award, Then & Now for Best Contemporary Romance and Finding Home for Best Novella. Marianne is a lifelong resident of Michigan and an active member of Romance Writers of America, most notably the Greater Detroit Chapter where she served two terms as President.

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Country music bad boy Chase Bradington is on the comeback trail. Fresh from rehab for alcohol addiction, and transformed by the power of Christ, Chase is battling to rediscover the music he loves and a career he nearly ruined. Then he meets up and comer, Pyper Brock, and instantly sparks ignite.

Pyper knows of Chase’s reputation, so despite a rampant attraction to the handsome and talented icon, she soundly dismisses his romantic overtures. Decades ago, her father, in a drunken rage, tossed her and her mother onto the streets. No way will Pyper make the mistake of falling for a man whose done battle with the bottle.

What happens when Chase’s quest to win Pyper’s love breaks down chains of resentment and eases the long buried wounds of her childhood? And what happens when Pyper’s father shows up in Nashville, clean, sober and seeking a chance to apologize?

Can Pyper follow a pathway to peace when it comes to her father? Can she fully trust Chase? Above all, can a sin damaged past be released in favor of forgiveness?

Available in print and e-book formats:

Amazon ~ Barnes & Noble ~ Christian Book ~ Pelican Book Group

The Power of Words by Texie Susan Gregory

Texie Susan Gregory

As writers, we’re aware that words can encourage and inspire, but there’s also a flip side to that power. Author Texie Susan Gregory shares what almost stopped her journey to publication. ~ Dawn

The Power of Words

Every night when I was a little girl, Mother sat on my bed and with her expressive voice and face brought life to a Bible story.  I knew the stories so well that sometimes the people seemed like distant relatives—grandfather Abraham, Uncle Paul, cousin Esther.

After discovering Elizabeth Speare’s book, The Bronze Bow, I realized people other than those I ‘knew’ had lived and loved and laughed during Bible times.

Astonishing! 

Searching for other Biblical novels, I was dismayed to discover there were very few in the school library. Thus began both the dream to see my book on a bookshelf and the quest to write the stories of the unknown people of Biblical times. 

As a ten year old, my first attempt—an ambitious undertaking about Mary Magdalene - was typed on onion paper. (Remember that thin, easily erasable paper?)

Fast forward to college when I dared show a short story to an esteemed professor. His words still echo through my mind. “If you enjoy it, keep writing but nothing will ever come of it.”

Devastated, I quit writing.

A harsh response? Yes, but so much more—a lesson in the power of words.

Years later as a young mother, an understanding of the significance and incredible influence of mothering bubbled up and over. Words spilled onto pages, first as letters to my children, then as vignettes that I performed as monologues at conferences and churches.

The bulb of a dream which had ‘hibernated’ for years, strengthened by life and nourished by the prayers of a mother who continued to believe I was a writer, pushed its little head out of Fear and into Hope. I joined a writer’s group in our church and attended the Mt. Hermon Christian Writer’s Conference where writers are encouraged to approach editors and agents.

Abject terror might begin to describe my fear as I approached first one and then another editor/agent.  Without exception they were kind, attentive, and encouraging.

When an agent advised developing one of the vignettes into a novel, I was dumbfounded. Was it possible? How do you do that?

Choosing Jochebed, the mother of Moses as ‘dough’, I pulled out my writer’s rolling pin, dusted the surface with prayer and began to shape the story into being.

The theme? A lesson I learned years ago—the power of our words ripple through years and lives. The incredible influence we wield as writers/parents/teachers carries enormous responsibility. 

Slender Reeds

Sender Reeds

Jochebed’s Hope is the story of a mother’s influence, of frayed hope and the search for faith. It is a story of relationships between a mother and daughter, three childhood friends, and the love story of the most powerful man on earth.

Texie Susan Gregory holds a master’s degree in Counseling from Appalachian State University and a Master of Religious Education from Golden Gate Baptist Theological Seminary. She has taught in both public and private schools, worked as a hospital chaplain and been a ministry wife for thirty-one years. She and her husband moved to Maryland a year ago. They have two children, Tyler (28) and Elizabeth (26).

You can learn more and connect with Texie at the following online sites:

Author website: www.texiesusangregory.com  

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/texiesusangregory/