By Suzanne Woods Fisher A while ago, I read an interview in my local newspaper featuring a woman who had just turned one hundred years old. The reporter wanted to know this centenarian’s inner motivation. What had given her that “oomph factor” to live so long? “I want to know,” she said, “what happens next.” That comment hit me like …
Six Ways to Write While the World is Stressing You Out
By Allie Pleiter As the author of How to WRITE When Everything Goes WRONG—A Practical Guide to Writing Through Tough Times, I’ve been getting a lot of cries for help from writers these days. The crisis we find ourselves in right now can squelch any writer’s creative energy. New words can feel impossible, the focus to revise eludes us, and …
Cooking Up a Story
By Tanara McCauley “Are these…scones?” My teen’s guess was generous, considering the cookies looked more like jagged blue biscuits coated in a suspicious glaze. She held one in her hand, eyes skeptical. I frowned at the cookie-biscuit-scone between her fingers and shook my head. It was a lemon blueberry cookie, or it was supposed to be. Only I’d had to …
“Thrifting” Your Photos
By Mesu Andrews My daughters are so fun and silly. When we got together last fall, they took me thrifting with them, and—WOW! They’re really good at it! Goodwill, yard sales, and antique shops are their gold mines with unclaimed treasures waiting to be harvested. I’ve been looking at my bajillion photos the same way. Sure, the pic I took …
Boredom as Writing Inspiration
By JPC Allen Little did I realize when I wrote this post in March how many of us would be battling boredom in the near future. Every month on my blog, I choose some aspect about the month—a holiday or the weather—and brainstorm ideas about how to use the month as writing inspiration. March is my least favorite month. I’m …
Want the Ball
By Renee Hodges You’re in exercise or dance class. Floor-to-ceiling mirrors face your group as you flow as one with the men and women around you. You are in the zone. Pulse racing to the rhythmic thumping of the sound system, you push yourself to keep up when encouraged by the pint-sized instructor with the wireless headset. Then you see …
Sheltered by the Resurrection
By Christine Sunderland Christian writers shelter their stories, then baptize them with resurrection life. We have been sheltering-in-place in the San Francisco Bay Area this 2020 Lenten season, hoping to slow the flu virus Covid-19, and staying home has provided an appropriate time to reflect, to pray, in effect, to observe a better, greater Lent. In going through some old …
Needing to be seen
By Lana Christian Writing is largely a solitary proposition. Then comes the need to be seen. But the coronavirus has limited us in ways we never could have imagined. Countless book launches have been canceled. Authors fear their years of work may never be seen. Their collective cries blanket social media. How can I get people to notice me and …
3 Tips to Sort Out Contradictory Research
by Mesu Andrews On our recent Israel tour, I was reminded that archaeologists and scholars are incredibly smart—but they can’t know everything for certain. Shouldn’t they know where Jesus was crucified and buried? The Christian Conundrum Our Catholic brothers and sisters begin winding their way through Jerusalem along the Via Dolarosa—the Way of the Cross—starting at Herod’s Antonia Fortress. At …
The Journey of Research
By Tema Banner I love research. I think most historical fiction writers would agree, it is one of the fascinating adventures of the writer’s world. With each new fact we uncover, our stories can take twist and turns that we never imagined! The time period preferred by this historical writer is American Colonial, but God had other plans and I …