Big News!

I’ve been silent lately here on the blog, and it’s time to tell my recent story. The life of a writer (which is what I call myself these days) can be an up and down convoluted mystery. And then, just about when you think nothing’s ever going to come of it, it all comes together in a breathtaking finale.

Over three years ago, I felt impressed by God to take on a money adventure and to write about it. It was a one-year long project. Near the end of that year, I met a literary agent who was excited about my book and wanted to represent me. I signed a contract of representation with him. He required me to write an official book proposal that he would forward to publishers. I wrote it, had both the proposal and the manuscript edited, and submitted both the proposal and the finished manuscript. That book: Risking It All: One Woman’s Adventure Giving Away Her Income.

I began waiting while my agent pitched it to various publishers.

While waiting on that book, I began the research for another book project—a book about our family’s pretzel business. As the great-great-granddaughter of the founder of America’s first commercial pretzel bakery (Julius Sturgis), I have a lot to say about pretzels, and the family had been pestering me for years to tell the story. Weeks of researching and writing turned into months. That book: Twisted: Mindful Pretzel Consumption.

While waiting on both these books, son Caleb experienced a horrific aircraft accident, shelving the other book projects for a time. I felt compelled to tell his story, in the hopes that other families experiencing traumas of their own could draw hope from our story. So I began to write this third book: The Day My Son Fell from the Sky.

Still waiting on Risking It All, I completed writing the second and third books and had them both edited. Together my agent and I reached a decision on the Risking It All book, and I then moved forward on the tasks of formatting the three manuscripts into book form and designing covers. My good friend Sue Fairchild took my visions for the covers and designed them into books I am now proud to hold in hand.

Another project had been rolling around in my head for several years—a Read It, Write It, Live It series of scripture writing workbooks. While Sue worked on the other book covers, I commissioned an artist to create art for the workbook covers and I wrote the workbook entries.

Finally, Sue formatted the workbooks into final form. At this time there are two complete with more in the design process.

All this to say that the creation of 5 books—3 paperbacks and 2 workbooks has come to completion within weeks of each other. All have been loaded to Amazon and are now available for people to purchase, read, and use.

Whew! When I look at all the finished books, I feel a little overwhelmed. A lot of work came to fruition seemingly all at once.

I’ll conclude here by thanking so many of you who have cheered me on over these last three years, asked me about my progress, and waited patiently to see these books I’ve repeatedly promised are coming. You’re the best and I’m grateful! I hope you’ll enjoy reading these stories and using the workbooks.

Stay tuned. I plan to post excerpts from each book throughout the next weeks.

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