From the Ashes of Courage

Now’s Your Chance to Get Back at Me

Just a quick announcement, since I was feeling ill this week and didn’t get to write a proper Friday post. If you want to get back at me for the picky comments I’ve been making on everyone’s books over at Goodreads, or if you thought one of my reviews was petty and opinionated (which it [...]

Christian Fiction, What’s Wrong with It?

Sunday, a friend of mine in church was wearing a T-shirt from a band I didn’t recognize. I asked, “Who are they? Is that a Christian band?” “Well,” he said, “they’re a bunch of Christians who are in a band, but they’re not a Christian band.” I understood immediately. “Like I’m a Christian who writes [...]

Friday Fun & Snippet: Starting a New Business

Remember when I used to post Friday Snippets here? I used to enjoy reading what other writers were writing. Unfortunately, the meme faded out of use. But that doesn’t mean I can’t still post a snippet here. This is the opening scene in From the Ashes of Courage (my newly released novel, which you can [...]

“From the Ashes of Courage” First Book Reading

I’ll post tomorrow the short post about Julie and Julia that I was planning to finish today, because this was way more exciting. The first box of copies of From the Ashes of Courage came today! With this book, I did not order a proof copy, so I spent the last week nervous that it [...]

An Ice-encrusted Car Means that Flowers Are Near

Last night, in between my own personal renditions of the Mission Impossible theme on guitar, I walked out to the car, to drive to practice. And much to my surprise, clad in a tee-shirt, jeans, and denim jacket, I had completely forgotten about the snow storm we got here a couple days ago. Frozen snow [...]

Teaser Tuesdays, and FtAoC News

Yesterday, we finalized From the Ashes of Courage and sent it off to the printer’s. We’ll get a pre-order page for autographed copies up on the shop ASAP. Amazon and BN.com &c should have it on their sites by February 1, and Google Books &c soon thereafter. In the meantime, I’ve released the ebook version, [...]

Writing the Opposite Sex

One of the axioms of writing is that you should write only what you know from experience. Writers extend that to say that you really only know how to write your own sex: men write only male characters well, and women write only female characters well. That’s why, they say, practically all romance novelists are [...]

A Dream to Explore

A quick midnight blog post and an announcement. I swear I did not coordinate this with Jamie Ridler. It’s either an astounding coincidence or a message from God. At midnight, a couple hours ago, Jamie prompted for Wishcasting Wednesday, “What dream do you wish to explore?” And as the song says, a dream is a [...]

Have you ever dreamed a New Year’s wish?

Once in a while you have one of those dreams that sticks with you after you wake up, moves you, speaks to you, but in ways you don’t understand upon waking. I had such a dream New Year’s morning. And the first thing I did was to write it down, or at least as much [...]

What is Love without Strings?

What is love without strings? I’ve phrased the question ambiguously. It could mean, “What is love, without strings?” Is there any love in existence that has no strings on it? We all put strings on our love. We all have conditions, whether or not or how much to love someone else, not for the sake [...]