Monthly Archives: January 2020

Bible study, Church History Novels, goals, Sharon Williams short stories, The Teachings, Writing

January Goals – Accomplisment

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This is Bessie’s first book. While it was a work-for-hire, she has obtained a license for a limited print run.

Last day of the month. Time to see how I did on my January goals.

  1. Blog twice a week, on Monday and Friday. I’ve been fairly successful blogging at this rate, and feel confident I can achieve this. Yes, did this. I don’t think I missed a regular day.
  2. Finish producing a book for a writing friend. This project is well along. I might finish it today; if not, it should only be a day or two from now. Yes, check this off as complete. I got this done not long after I posted the goals. I did a quickie cover, using PowerPoint and loading it into G.I.M.P. The quality wasn’t as good as we’d like, so I did it over from scratch in G.I.M.P. It was accepted by Amazon without needing correction, and have ordered copies. I was able to use G.I.M.P. without much consternation.
  3. The 5th story in my Sharon Williams Fonseca – Unconventional CIA Agent series.

    Edit my short story “Tango Delta Foxtrot”. The story is finished, and I’m in the editing process. My critique group hasn’t particularly liked the plot, but I don’t know how to change it. Whether I can accomplish this in January is a little iffy. Not only did I get the editing done on this, but I also published it. The cover isn’t the greatest, but it’s the best I can do.

  4. Attend writing group meetings as much as possible. My travel schedule may make it impossible to attend one, but hopefully I’ll be at the other. My writing groups held only two meetings this month. I missed the meeting of the Village Lake Writers and Poets due to travel but attended the critique meeting of Scribblers & Scribes of Bella Vista. 
  5. Start my next book, tentatively titled The Teachings. This will be book 3 in my church history novels series. I plan on starting this later this week. Writing will take several months. I did this, but just barely. On Wednesday I created the files and reviewed my notes on the plot. Yesterday I entered the first words in the book. I think I wrote only about 250 words, but it’s a start. So yes, I did this.
  6. I found too many errors in this book to let it go. So I corrected the text and re-published.

    Finish a proof-reading of Acts Of Faith and republish a corrected version. I’ve proofread about a third of it and found more errors than I like. Done! I completed the editing mid-month, and uploaded the new insides around the 22nd. No changes in the cover.

  7. Create a PDF version of Acts Of Faith: Leader’s Guide in 8.5×11 inch format. This is a brief task that should be no problem to complete. As I said in the goal, this was a quick one, and I did it with no problem.

And, actually, I completed one other major task that came up long after I made my goals post.

8. Read/proofread a book for a member of SSBV, who has a short window of time to get some changes made to her previously published book about to be re-published. I was able to do this. I finished the reading yesterday and e-mailed corrections and comments to the author. I’ll eventually write a book review of it.

So, it was a good, productive month. Perhaps tomorrow, or perhaps not until my regular Monday post, I’ll lay out my February goals.

book reviews, C.S. Lewis

Book Review: Essays Presented to Charles Williams

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This will become a part of my permanent library, an affectation that I could someday be an academic.

With C.S. Lewis being on of my favorite authors, I never pass up an opportunity to add something he’s written to my library. Some time ago I found a paperback titled Essays Presented to Charles Williams, edited by C.S. Lewis, in a used book store. Needless to say I snatched it up. Having within the last year finally finished Mere Christianity after several previous failed attempts, I went to the bookshelf in the storeroom, hoping I would easily find this 145 page volume there, and sure enough it was right where I thought I remembered it to be.

The premise of the book was to honor Charles Williams, a member of the Oxford Inklings, the author critique group formed by Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien. While Lewis and Tolkien were academics at Oxford, some others in the group weren’t. Lewis read one of Williams’ novels and liked it so much he wrote to him. At the same time, Williams, in his duties at the Oxford University Press, had just read Lewis’ The Allegory of Love, loved it, and was ready to write to Lewis. Mutual admiration of the other’s writings was the start of this friendship.

Lewis invited Williams to come to Oxford from London and visit the Inklings. He did so, and visited on occasion from 1936 to 1939. The outbreak of World War 2 caused the Oxford Press to temporary relocate from London to Oxford, at which time Williams became a regular member of the Inklings.

In 1945, as the war was ending, Lewis wanted to honor his friend and talked about putting a book of essays together, a typical way of doing honor in the literary world of that time. Alas, Williams died suddenly in 1945 before the project really started. Lewis persisted, however, and the book came together and was published in 1948. My paperback was the 4th printing, published in 1977.

Those contributing essays were Dorothy Sayers, Tolkien, Lewis, Owen Barfield, Gervase Mathew, and Lewis’ brother Warren. All except Sayers were part of the Inklings (well, Barfield not so much as he was based in London, but he was there occasionally and was a good friend of all of them).

The essays were literary in nature. Sayers’ “…And Telling you a Story”, Tolkien’s “On Fairy-Stories”, and Lewis’ “On Stories” are obviously about literature, specifically on story-telling. Barfield’s “Poetic Diction and Legal Fiction” fits in that category. Gervase’s “Marriage and Amour Courtois…” fits as well. Warren Lewis’ “The Galleys of France” doesn’t quite fit in with the others. It’s about what he learned from his research into 16th and 17th Century France, which was the topic of his writings.

Each of the essays I found to be a bit tedious, Warren and C.S. Lewis’ the least so, Tolkien’s the most (also the longest). In fact, I couldn’t get through Tolkien’s essay. I struggled with it, reading a few pages a day, reading slowly, trying to capture what Tolkien wanted to communicate. Alas, I finally gave up and skipped the last ten pages of 52-page essay and went on to the others. This is true of all of Tolkien’s writings for me. I have never completed reading The Lord Of The Rings due to how difficult I find it. I have The Sillmarillion waiting for me to get to, but I’m not excited about it.

Excited about getting to a book. That was my feeling when this finally popped to the top of my “reading pile”. It didn’t fulfill my expectations. Perhaps it’s because of the distance in time and space between 1948 England and 2019 United States. Perhaps it’s the academic nature of the essays. Perhaps it’s just that these authors knew what their friend would like and wrote in that way. Whatever it was, the book disappointed to some extent.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m glad I bought the book, glad I read it, and will gladly give it a place in my permanent library. But, was this the best use of my valuable reading time? Perhaps not. Still, I can see myself going back to this a decade hence, re-reading it from cover to cover, somehow drawing meaning from Tolkien’s essay and finishing it, gaining more insight from the others on a second read. Maybe in those ten years I’ll make another post and you’ll get to read all about it.

interviews

Author Interview – Romance Writer Jeni

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Romance Author Jeni has three books for sale at Amazon.

One of the members of Village Lake Writers & Poets, a writers group I’m a member of, is Jeni. Jeni Who, you ask? She has a last name, but let’s just call her Jeni, the name she writes and publishes as. She recently presented the program at one of our monthly meetings. At the VLW&P Christmas party I sat across from her and had my first detailed conversation with her. I asked if she would let me interview her for An Arrow Through the Air, and she agreed. Here it is.

Q: Why did you decide to pursue writing as a career?

Jeni: Writing is in my blood. Creating characters is what I love!

Q: Since 2015, you’ve released three novels: Kellan’s Sweet Angel, Dirk’s Angel of Destiny, and Evan’s Sunset Angel. Is it fair to say you’re a romance writer?

Jeni: I am happy to say, I am a romance writer! With a dash of mystery, adventure and suspense!

Q: These are part of a series. Describe the series to us so far. And whose point of view are they in: the guy’s or the gal’s?

Jeni: In each of the books, I focus on certain characters and how they are affected by the sinister storyline. Thus far, you will learn about these men and how evil has interrupted and intertwined with their lives and the women they love.

As for point of view characters, according to the titles, it may indicate the stories are based on the male character’s point of view, but I feel, you get an insight of both the male and female characters point of view. This is what makes the story interesting and helps move it along. Is there one character’s point of view I focus on more? I’m not sure. But, I welcome you to read the books and let me know.J

Q: Your book covers feature handsome, muscled men. What does that suggest about the contents? Are these sweet romances, or saucy love stories?

Jeni: These love stories are sweet and sexy but also have mystery and adventure.

Q: Does this series go on? What “angel” will your fans read about in the future?

Jeni: The Angel series continues. It’s hard to tell right now which “Angel” we will read about next! I, too, am excited to find out and will share with all my readers when the book is done! J

So here’s a writer for some of you romance readers to try out. You can find Jeni’s books on Amazon.

book reviews

Book Review – Holy War for the Promised Land

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I’m a little behind on my book reviews. Catching up by starting with the last one I finished.

Dolan’s book is very readable, and gives an excellent description of the Arab-Israeli conflict at that point in time, the beginning of the 1990s.

Before our recent trip to Mexico I was looking for a paperback to take with me to read in airports, on planes, and at night in hotels. I decided to look in a box of books in the garage that was waiting to be donated and found this, Holy War for the Promised Land by David Dolan. I’m pretty sure I never read this, and don’t think I bought it anywhere. How it came in our possession, and why it was in a donation box unread is anyone’s guess. It had a book marker in it, a random piece of paper that doesn’t match anything we have in the house. A minor mystery.

It’s an excellent book. Published in 1991 (so written probably in 1990), it covered the Holy Land situation as it was at that time. Obviously, close to 30 years of history has occurred since then and the book could easily be updated.

Dolan is a Christian who lived in Israel for many years, mostly as a correspondent, leading up to and including the years of the Palestinian Intifada. He starts chapters with an experience he lived through, then shifts to the issues of the broader conflict. He goes back to the times of the Patriarchs, of dispersing of the Jews on two occasions, of Christianity spreading through the Middle East, followed by the rise of Islam.

It goes on from there to the Crusades, the Ottoman conquest, and into the 20th Century. The migration of Jews to the Holy Land, the conflicts with the Arabs, the role of Britain, the creation of Israel by the United Nations, and the subsequent conflicts are all covered. He did a good job, I believe, in approaching the conflict from both sides. The Arab/Moslem hatred for Israel and Jews, the strong measures Israel took to guarantee its security, the dashed hopes for peace, and the intransigence of both sides are all covered.

I naturally sympathize with the Jews, believing Israel has a right to exist with secure borders. It’s hard to see that happening when a people who are 20 times as numerous and have 100 times as much land have vowed to wipe them off the face of the earth and say so every day. I’m fairly sure Dolan believes more or less the same. Though the plight of the Palestinians can’t be ignored. Their condition is described in the book, though no real solution is proposed. That’s okay. As a hard news correspondent, Dolan reports the news, he doesn’t editorialize.

I found the book very readable. It served its purpose. I read large amounts of it in airports and on planes. Not so much in hotels, as the efforts of touring made reading less enticing. I completed the 254 pages in eleven sittings, most of it while traveling.

It wasn’t that long ago that I read a similar book, Jews, God and History and reviewed it on this blog. The subject matter is different, as Dolan’s book focuses only on Israel and adjacent lands, not on wherever Jews lived in the world. So it’s hard to say one is better than the other. Dolan’s book was more easily read.

Is it worth your finding a copy and reading it? Probably not, mainly because so much more has happened since. As to what becomes of it, it’s an easy choice. It’s going back into the donation box. Too many books in the house, gotta get rid of some. I’m quite happy I read it, but don’t see me ever needing it again.

interviews

Yellowstone Yondering: New Book by Kristen Joy Wilks

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Released today, January 17, 2020. Kristen is getting a nice list of available books.

Today is the release day for Kristen Joy Wilks’ latest book, Yellowstone Yondering [link to it at Amazon and at Barnes and Noble].

I interviewed Kristen before on the blog. We looked into her “Genre Focus Disorder”, a writing malady that she and I share. But she’s finished the new book and it’s out today!. Let’s see what we can learn about it.

Q: What is your book about?

Kristen: When a free-spirited wildlife photographer loses her Scottish terrier in a herd of bison, she sets out to rescue her furbaby before he is devoured. But will she succeed when Yellowstone National Park is chock full of boiling, bubbling, and rampaging hazards (both mammalian and geographical)—not to mention a rule-obsessed park ranger whose many rescues thwart her efforts to find her poor pup?

Q: I’ve been to Yellowstone Park twice and loved it. What inspired you to write Yellowstone Yondering?

 

Tourists might stay on the designated paths, but what about rambunctious Scottish terriers?

Kristen: Our family went on Vacation to Yellowstone when my sons were 12, 10, and 8.  We saw many terrifying warning signs while there. They are very exciting and show a drawing of the same little boy being in various perils all over the park. My husband named him “Jimmy” and there was a sign with him running from a bear, being tossed by a bison, and succumbing to a thermal zone. I knew that if a I had a “rules-optional” character, that she could get into a whole lot of trouble in Yellowstone. Plus, a rules conscious ranger would clash with her admirably. We left our dog behind, but saw lots of ways she could have gotten into trouble at Yellowstone.  I almost always have a dog in my books and so after reading the stringent rules for taking pets into the park, I knew that there were romantic comedy possibilities all over the place!

Q: Write what you know; write what you experience. I love it. How else did you research Yellowstone Yondering?

Kristen: I watched YouTube videos of bears breaking into cars before penning that scene in the book. Bears are actually quite good at this! I interviewed a Yellowstone park ranger, talked with a former park ranger, and researched all of the rules for visiting the park. I looked up which plants grow in the area, how much one is fined for feeding bears, watched videos of bears being trapped and released for scientific purposes as well as perusing many cute photos of Scottish terriers. We owned a Scottie mix when I was young, so I am well-acquainted with their boldness. Our family also visited Yellowstone together.

Q: What real events did you use in Yellowstone Yondering?

Kristen:

1.     Our family did indeed drive to Yellowstone in an old van with the windows stuck half down, no AC, and Weird Al music blaring.
2.     My grandmother actually did have a bear bluff charge her just like in the story. It was a black bear near our house, but grizzlies will do the same thing.
3.     My grandparents saw a man on a motorcycle drive through Hayden valley with bison pressing all around him. This got me thinking about book possibilities for sure!
4.     When my mother was a girl, and it was legal to feed bears, she once watched her father feeding marshmallows to a bear (the park used to encourage this) and then her Dad decided that the bear had had enough but the bear disagreed and chased him around and around the campfire while his wife and children hid in the camper laughing at him. The bear won. He finally tossed the bag of marshmallows over his shoulder and made a run for their vehicle. The scene with the grizzly, the marshmallows, and the campfire was inspired by this real family story.
There you have it, folks. Yellowstone Yonderings looks like a good book to pick up. Here’s a little about Kristen, along with links of where to find her and her books.
Kristen Joy Wilks: romance author adding in real world wilderness.

Author Bio

 

Kristen Joy Wilks lives in the beautiful Cascade Mountains with her camp director husband, three fierce sons, and a large and slobbery Newfoundland dog. She has blow-dried a chicken, fought epic Nerf battles instead of washing dishes, transported a gallon bag of cooked bacon inside her purse, and discovered a smuggled gardener snake in her sons’ bubble bath. Her stories, devotionals, and articles have appeared in Nature Friend, Clubhouse, Thriving Family, Keys for Kids, The Christian Journal, Splickety, Spark, and Havok. She writes romantic comedies for Pelican Book Group, including Copenhagen Cozenage, The Volk Advent, Athens Ambuscade, Spider Gap, and Yellowstone Yondering. Kristen loves to write about the humor and Grace that can be found amidst the detritus of life. Much like the shiny quarter one member of their household swallowed and then found in the pot four days later. If God is good enough to grant us these gems, she figures that someone should be putting them to the page. Kristen can be found tucked under a tattered quilt in an overstuffed chair at 4:00am writing a wide variety of implausible tales, or at www.kristenjoywilks.com. If you would rather enjoy photos of charging bison, Newfoundland dogs, and attacking squid then by all means visit her “What I’m Writing About” board on Pinterest https://www.pinterest.com/kristenjwilks7/what-im-writing-about/
Church History Novels, family, The Teachings, Writing

Today is the Day

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The day I’m supposed to begin writing The Teachings. Alas, I’m still in Texas, doing the grandparent thing. There’s also stock trading to work on.

This morning I baked two loaves of banana bread (out of the over now and very good); got a roast on (veggies still to be done); made three stock trades—or maybe it’s four; loaded and started the dishwasher; and washed dishes by hand.

I still have a mountain of paperwork to go through—the stuff the kids never seem to get to. And I need to run by the hardware store and pick up something for the house, something I will then have to work on.

So I don’t think I’ll get to The Teachings today, not unless it’s in the evening after the kids have gone to bed. I may do a little then, just to say I started today. Wednesday, however, January 15, will be my real start day.

self-publishing, Writing

2020 Writing Goals

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I almost forgot that today is my day to blog. I had said that I would next blog about my writing goals for 2020. Here it is after noon, and I just remembered this.

Fortunately, I did spend some time this week thinking about those goals, writing them out, thinking some more, writing them out again. I believe I’ve settled on a few goals that I think are doable. At least I’m willing to make them public and work toward them. I’ve divided these into two categories, call them primary and secondary. Here are the primary goals.

  • Write and publish The Teachings. This is book number three in my church history novels series, though it will be the fourth one written. It fills the gap between Doctor Luke’s Assistant and Preserve The Revelation.
  • Make corrections to Acts Of Faith and re-publish it. As I’m going through the teaching process, I keep finding little errors that need correcting. A couple are bigger than little. I actually plan on doing this next week. I have someone willing to promote it but I’ve asked him to hold off until I make the corrections.
  • Write and publish the next book in the Documenting America series. This will most likely be Run-up To Revolution.
  • Finish and publish “Tango Delta Foxtrot”, the next short story in my Sharon Williams Fonseca series. In fact, the story is written and in the final editing process. I’ve been slowed trying to incorporate comments from my critique group. I need to make some final decisions and run with it.
  • Help a fellow writer get her next book published. In fact, I may have completed that this morning. I made a tweak to the cover and uploaded everything to Amazon KDP. The review so far has said the proof copy is ready to order, so it will most likely be found acceptable.

As to the secondary goals, here they are.

  • Complete the genealogy book Stephen Cross of Ipswich. This has been on the shelf for several years. As I recall it was more than 75% done. I hope soon to dust it off in a month or two and see where I left it.
  • Write an article for Voice of the Martyrs magazine and submit it. An idea has come to me for this and I don’t want to let it drop without seeing where it could go.
  • Write and publish another Bible study. I have five studies already developed and taught which could serve for this, and one that is gelling in my mind. I’m not sure if or when this will happen, but I like the idea.
  • Begin writing Volume 3 of The Gutter Chronicles. I have the outline mostly done. Maybe I’ll get to this, maybe I won’t. For sure I won’t if I dong get it in the goals.

I think that’s enough. If I get through my primary goals, and one or two secondaries, I’ll feel really good. I’ll update on occasion as the year winds on.

Bible study, Church History Novels, critique group, self-publishing, Sharon Williams short stories, The Teachings, Writing

January 2020 Writing Goals

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I’m still working on my annual goals for 2020. I’m just not sure of what I’m going to attempt this year. So, I’m going to start on goals for January. That’s a short enough time frame I should be able to project 30 days ahead. Here are my goals.

  1. Blog twice a week, on Monday and Friday. I’ve been fairly successful blogging at this rate, and feel confident I can achieve this.
  2. Finish producing a book for a writing friend. This project is well along. I might finish it today; if not, it should only be a day or two from now.
  3. Edit my short story “Tango Delta Foxtrot”. The story is finished, and I’m in the editing process. My critique group hasn’t particularly liked the plot, but I don’t know how to change it. Whether I can accomplish this in January is a little iffy.
  4. Attend writing group meetings as much as possible. My travel schedule may make it impossible to attend one, but hopefully I’ll be at the other.
  5. Start my next book, tentatively titled The Teachings. This will be book 3 in my church history novels series. I plan on starting this later this week. Writing will take several months.
  6. Finish a proof-reading of Acts Of Faith and republish a corrected version. I’ve proofread about a third of it and found more errors than I like.
  7. Create a PDF version of Acts Of Faith: Leader’s Guide in 8.5×11 inch format. This is a brief task that should be no problem to complete.

I think this is enough. I’m writing this Friday evening to post on Monday morning. It’s possible I’ll add an item or two.

Adam Of Jerusalem, Bible study, Church History Novels, critique group, self-publishing, Sharon Williams short stories, The Teachings, Writing

Looking Back as the New Year Starts

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The writing of this book was finished in December 2018. Editing took some time, and I didn’t publish it till May 2019.

One year ago I entered the world of retirees. It was unchartered territory for me. I knew I had more than enough interests to stay busy, but how would I structure my days? What would I accomplish? Would it be more or less than I wanted to do? How would writing and stock trading and property upkeep and a dozen other things vie for my time?

At that time, in January 2019, I did not write a blog post about writing goals. It was all too new. I didn’t know what I could accomplish in my writing. I had recently completed the first draft of Adam Of Jerusalem and I was letting it simmer while the Christmas busyness was in progress. So that would be on the table early in the new year. But what else would I accomplish?

I think I will start this year on An Arrow Through The Air by three posts about goals. First will be what I accomplished last month, then will be a look-back at the whole year, then will be a look-ahead to 2020 and what I hope to accomplish. I’m still thinking about the new year, so this schedule will give me time to think some more.

I last posted about goals at the end of October, for November. Not sure why I didn’t do a December goals post. Here’s what I said for November, and how well I did on them over a two-month period.

  1. As always, blog twice a week on Monday and Friday. I may have to write some ahead and schedule their posting. I did fairly well on this. Some of them I did write ahead of time for later posting. I missed one day in each month.
  2. Attend writing groups. One group is considering adding a second meeting in the month, so it might be three instead of two meetings total for the two groups. I attended every meeting available. One was cancelled. Another was a time to wrap books as Christmas presents to go to a middle school. It was a fun time.
  3. Finish Tango Delta Foxtrot. I think this is about two hours of writing. Surely I can do that. I finished this, and gave it to my critique group (Scribblers and Scribes of Bella Vista). Waiting on a full range of critiques, but initial response, but for installments and for the full document isn’t good.
  4. Finish reading in two books that are research for The Teachings. This is quite doable. I’m not reading all of Josephus—just enough to know about a certain action in Jerusalem at the beginning of the war in 66 a.d. Yes, I got this done. From Josephus I have selected the dates and locations for certain scenes. From the other book I have a good idea of the composition of The Didache. From the two I’ve made an outline.  When I sit down to work on it, probably next week, I hope it starts to flow.
  5. Finish the Leader’s Guide for Acts Of Faith. This should be doable, in the original concept only. I’ll be working toward publishing it in December, most likely as an e-book only. Another thing finished. I received some feedback about potential changes that would have taken time, but decided not to make them. For now this is an e-book, but I’m planning on making a PDF in 8.5×11 format to give to people who ask.

So, two months of reasonably good accomplishment. Hopefully this will continue into January 2020.