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Multi-published author Donna Fletcher Crow graciously hosted me on her beautiful blog. Thanks, Donna!

http://www.donnafletchercrow.com/articles.php?id=111

Fiction writers are the ultimate artists, in my opinion, because we incorporate all the disciplines in our work. Like painters, we create scenes and color settings, using keystrokes rather than brush strokes. Like photographers and filmmakers, we provide snapshots of real life. The musician in us adds rhythm to our stories with ear-pleasing beats to move the action forward and keep the reader tuned-in. In the manner of a sculptor, we chip away unnecessary words and sand blemishes until the final product resembles our vision as nearly as possible. Choreographers may lead dancers across a stage, but our stories float through imaginations. Playwrights, songwriters and poets strive to choose and arrange words so that they ring with meaning and emotion. So do we. But in the end, readers—in the company of singers and actors—are the ones who breathe life into our words. God bless our readers!

Perhaps the most fundamental religious question I can ask myself today is:

Do I really believe the Good News of Jesus Christ?
Do I hear his word spoken to my heart:

“Shalom, be at peace.
I understand your fears, your failures, your brokenness.
I don’t expect you to be perfect.
I have been there.
All is well.
You have my love.
You don’t have to pay for it, and you can’t deserve it.
You only have to open and receive it.
You only have to say yes to my love –
a love beyond anything you can intellectualize or imagine.”

Brennan Manning
Reflections for Ragamuffins

Make a careful exploration of who you are and the work you have been given and then sink yourself into that. Don’t compare yourself with others. Each of you must take responsibility for doing the creative best you can with your own life.” Galatians 6:4 (The Message)

Thought you-all might enjoy my guest visit today on Eileen Rife’s blog. She’s the author of the Born for India trilogy. Her most recent novel, Second Chance, will release in a month.

www.eileen-rife.blogspot.com

Just saw this on WordPress. So true!

Easy reading is damn hard writing. — Nathaniel Hawthorne

Just wanted to let you know that for a limited time “Winds of Wyoming” is FREE on Amazon. http://www.amazon.com/Winds-Wyoming-Neilson-Novel-ebook/dp/B006SPP7G8/ref=sr_1_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1326999416&sr=1-1

Years ago, in my early writing days, I heard a writing conference  speaker offer this pithy advice: “Look up.” We humans tend to look down, he said, or around us, but rarely above our heads. Looking up can expand our world view and draw us outside of ourselves. As a result, we’ll be better people and better writers.

One of the psalmists wrote this in the Bible: “I lift up my eyes to the hills–where does my help come from? My help comes from the Lord, the Maker of heaven and earth.” (Psalms 121:1-2) Two psalms later, the thought was repeated, though a bit differently. “I lift up my eyes to you, to you whose throne is in heaven.” (123:1)

I love living near mountains and watching the sky change above them, whether it’s the morphing of sunrise and sunset colors or storms building and bursting. But I forget to regularly look at the sky directly above me. When I do, I feel my soul stretch and burst from it’s husk of worries and to-do list concerns. I feel freedom and sense possibilities. I’m also reminded of our Creator God, who made the mountains and the sky and whose “throne is in heaven.”

“Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.” (Hebrews 12:2)

Fresh out of a Pennsylvania penitentiary armed with a marketing degree, Kate Neilson heads to Wyoming anticipating an anonymous new beginning as a guest-ranch employee. A typical twenty-five-year-old woman might be looking to lasso a cowboy, but her only desire is to get on with life on the outside—despite her growing interest in the ranch owner. When she discovers a violent ex-lover followed her west, she fears the past she hoped to hide will imprison her once again.

http://www.amazon.com/Winds-Wyoming-Neilson-Novel-ebook/dp/B006SPP7G8/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1325893519&sr=8-1

“I recently read an interview in which the Nobel Prize-winning novelist Toni Morrison was asked why she had become a great writer, what books she had read, what method she had used to structure her practice. She laughed and said, ‘Oh, no, that is not why I am a great writer. I am a great writer because when I was a little girl and walked into a room where my father was sitting, his eyes would light up. That is why I am a great writer. That is why. There isn’t any other reason.’”

~ from Searching for God Knows What by Don Miller ~