The first four volumes are now published—or will be as of tomorrow.
Over the last five or six days, I have published Volume 4 of my Bible study series, A Walk Through Holy Week. Titled A Difficult Meal, it covers the Last Supper as told in all four gospels. Although the fourth of eight volumes in the series, it was actually one of the earlier ones written, possibly the first. It has been patiently waiting in its folder for me to finish its brethren in order before it. Here’s the link to it at Amazon.
I set the publishing up to go live tomorrow, May 6. The e-book will be published that date, though it is ready for pre-order now. The print book was supposed to be ready the same day, but I’ve had some issues getting the print cover to meet Amazon’s requirements. I corrected it this morning and uploaded a replacement cover. If Amazon approves it, the print book should be available today or tomorrow.
I will now take a short break (a month or two) from publishing this series to do a few other key tasks. I’m not sure when I’ll do the publishing on Vols. 5 through 8, but it should be before the end of the year.
The first four volumes in this series are done, Volume 4 to be published in a few days.
It’s been a long time, close to six months, since I’ve posted monthly accomplishments and goals in my writing endeavors. The combination of health setbacks and travel kept me distracted and busy, not necessarily on writing things. But now I’ve finished my post-heart-surgery cardio rehab, and I’ve finished the PT regimen prior to potential knee surgery.
So my schedule is temporarily lighter and I’m able to think about goals for the coming months. I won’t say much about accomplishments, but I have completed some goals during the past half-year. I finished the last few volumes of my eight-volume Bible study, A Walk Through Holy Week, and published the first four of them. Vol. 4 will go live on Amazon on May 6.
Aside from that, my writing accomplishments were mainly in terms of organization. I found lots of loose papers from past writing efforts, and organized them into a permanent way. I don’t think I have many more loose paper stashes about the house.
So what’s up for the next month? I actually plan to work on a non-commercial product. Over the last couple of years, I transcribed the letters from our years living in Saudi Arabia, with the intent of publishing them in book form for our family. I illustrated it with photos from those years, but only a few photos. Full illustration was always part of my plan.
“The Saudi Years In Letters” will be the follow-up to this.
KYIL – print cover new size – improved 02While I was laid up from strokes and operations and our daughter came to help out, I had her sort through photos from those years and select and scan those she thought would be good in the book. She got through about half of them. In Nov-Dec, I was able to get through the rest of them. I also went through all the scans, crop them, and name them, and store them in findable places on the computer. I figure we have twice the number of photos scanned and ready to use as the book can reasonably support.
Therefore, the book it ready for the work of loading photos and arranging them in the books. I think this work will go fairly quickly, as I did the same work for the book of letters for our Kuwait years. I hope to start on this perhaps by tomorrow, and have a finished product by the end of the month.
That’s my only established writing goal for the month. I’ll see how it goes.
It’s so nice to have photos, isn’t it? Of family. Of the house. Of that big snowstorm in winter. Of the beautiful landscape scenes you see on summer vacation. Family Christmas celebration.
Then there’s the old photo album that your grandparents had and gave to your parents. Aunt Jane, great-aunt Elizabeth, photos of croquet games, unknown children. How great it is to have all that family history.
Until, that is, 50 years or more have passed. You are the only one still alive who remembers great-aunt Elizabeth, and you aren’t quite sure the woman you remember was actually great-aunt Elizabeth or a neighbor lady. You take stock after a cousin comes by with a box of photos and says, “Keep what your want and do what you want with the rest.” And you realize the box probably has 5,000 photos in it.
And you further realize you have similar boxes of photos of your own family, you dad’s family, your mom’s family, your spouse’s dad’s family, and your spouse’s mom’s family. Is it really possible that you have 20,000 photos in the house?
That’s where we’re at. We thinned out the book collection down to a manageable number for when we downsize. The photos come next. Digitize them, you say? That removes the stacks, but doesn’t really solve the problem. Someone, sometime, will have those digital files and wonder “who the heck are these people and why do I have these files?” No, they don’t take up a lot of physical space, but they are a type of clutter, a possession passed down that is not needed and probably not wanted. Something to leave to your children to make the decision on.
This is where we are. Probably 20,000 physical photos to do something with. At some point I’ll maybe count enough to see if my estimate is close.
My reading has trailed off a bit lately, in part due to health issues and in part due to reading choices not panning out. I laid two books aside at the 1/3rd point when the subject and writing turned out to not hold my interest. I suppose general busyness helped to rob reading time, with some of the busyness due to medical appointments.
Looking for a short read, I grabbed a book my wife had recently read and recommended: Paul Orjala: The Man, The Mission. It’s one of series of annual missions books our church published (or used to), this one from 2009-10. I think I read it back then but did not in the least remember it, so it was a fresh read. The book was of special interest to me because I briefly knew Paul when I attended the same church as he and his family in 1974-75. At that time, Paul was back from the mission field in Haiti and teaching at our seminary in Kansas City. I didn’t get to know him very well. He was already an experienced missionary and professor; I was new to the congregation and denomination. We didn’t hang out in the same circles.
But I got to know him a little. He was a nice man, well thought of by all, and pleasant spoken. The book told about his boyhood in San Diego, call to missions, assignment in Haiti, years teaching, and a later in life assignment in France. In all things, Paul was a faithful and effective servant of Christ. Much of our missions education curriculum. Paul is almost a legend in our church for the effectiveness of everything he touched. That includes considerable musical talent, which I saw him demonstrate in church services.
I’m glad Lynda found this book in the house and brought it to my attention. It was a good, short read about an amazing man and his service for God. I won’t read it again, nor do I think we should keep it, but I’m very glad I read it.
After my seizure late Thursday, that is. I blacked out for probably 30 to 45 minutes, coming to in the ambulance on the way to the hospital. By the time I got there, it was as if nothing had happened, except I had bitten my tongue. It was severely swollen and I could hardly talk. Swallowing was tough.
As of today, my energy is mostly back, but my speech and are still way sub-par. So this won’t be a real post today. Hopefully I’ll be back on Friday. Yesterday I was able to write a letter to a grandson and do a little editing on a Bible study.
Last night, at 11:30 p.m., I had another seizure. Lynda called 9-1-1. The ambulance transported me to the hospital. A CT scan showed no abnormalities, and I was back to normal, so they sent me home about 2:00 a.m.
Today I mainly rested. Fell asleep during the day and missed my PT appointment. Alas. I’m doing well but am quite tired.
Yes, even while I’m trying to edit the remaining volumes of A Walk Through Holy Week, and planning to then shift to book 3 in The Forest Throne series, and plan out a larger Documenting America series, and have two other books on the back burner waiting for a chance, a new idea/opportunity has come to mind. Actually, even more than one new work-in-progress may be on the near horizon.
The book I’m reading right now is titled Great Essays. As a result, I’ve been itching to write a couple of essays. I have them fairly firmly in mind. One is outlined in my head; the other isn’t that far along. I’m not quite sure of the timing of this. Possibly this week I will at least get the outline on paper.
Meanwhile, AWTHW is screaming at me “No! Don’t do it.”
The other w-i-p will almost certainly happen. It is a new Bible study that I’m planning for our adult Sunday school class (a.k.a. life group, a.k.a. community group). I prepared the outline/proposal for it tonight and am about to send it to my co-teacher for his approval, after which we will submit it to the pastoral staff for approval. If approved, I will start teaching it May 4, meaning I’ll have to begin the writing at least by April 28.
I won’t announce the title and subject matter just yet, not until I have approval and get a little way into the writing.
Why do I do this? Get started on new things before the old ones are done, or at least at a stopping point. My writing is like the water contained in an elevated tank that someone busts a hole in. The water rushes out, seeking a place to pool up. That’s how my writing is. And I suppose it always will be.
A well written book. As good as any book on writing that I’ve read. Easy to read; I got through it in about a week.
At some point in the deep, dark past, I obtained a copy of On Writing by Stephen King. It’s a 2009 edition of the original, which was published in 2001. The book is new, but I don’t remember buying it. I may have won it at a writing conference I attended in 2011, as a door prize. It sat on a shelf in our “auxiliary” bedroom in the storeroom, awaiting its turn to pop up on my reading pile. Assuming I got it in 2011 (for sure it was after 2009), it only took 14 years of its hibernating on the obscure shelf for me to notice it.
I have to say, of the many books I’ve read by writers for writers—some giving the writer’s journey and memoir and some focusing on writing techniques—this was probably the best I’ve read. King begins the book with his writing journey. It’s a bit of autobiography and a bit of the writing road he traveled on, about the early struggles to make it in life with meager earnings, needing a brief teaching career to put bread on the table.
That journey description serves as a lengthy introduction to the second part of the book, that of writing techniques. King brings out thoughts on both the creative process—how to dig ideas out of life and then make stories of them—and the specific wordsmithing he sees as needed to make the stories good ones.
In the book, he answers the two most common questions he gets. From readers: Where do you get your ideas? From writers: What is your editing process like?
One caution: King has no compunction again using strong language, in his novels and in this book. He believes writing should match the reality that the reader lives. Hence, he makes regular use of swear words. I’d rather not have to read that kind of thing but plowed on through it. I have to say that he does not use curse words gratuitously. When used in On Writing, they seem to be used in a way that they are used in everyday speech—at least to the best of my recollection. It’s been many years since I’ve been around that kind of talk.
I give this book 5-stars, mainly for the excellence in organization, writing, and completeness. But it is not a keeper. In fact, I already gave it to someone in my writing critique group.
The simple cover for the e-book. I will change out this cover after a while.
Volume 3 of my Bible study series, A Walk Through Holy Week, is published as both an e-book and paperback. Titled Coming Troubles, it covers what is known as the Olivet Discourse, when Jesus talked with his disciples. In the temple in Jerusalem, Jesus said that it was going to be torn down. After going to the Mount of Olives, the disciples asked him two questions:
When will these things happen, and what will be the sign they are about to take place? What will be the sign of your coming and of the end of the age?
Jesus goes on to give his famous discourse, a mix of prophecy and warning.
In some ways I feared to tread here, as a layman. So many sources are available for the study of end-times prophecy, I wonder if another small volume is needed. Probably not, but it’s part of the Holy Week story, so I decided to include it in my eight-volume series. I’ve already had a sale, which has propelled it into the top 100 of the category Religious Studies – Education.
The remaining five volumes in the series are written. I’m in the process of editing Vol. 4, and hope to have it published either late April or early May. I’m not sure if I’ll continue on editing the other volumes or take a break and work on something else.
An excellent read for anyone curious about Judaism and Christianity.
My wife and I continue to look through our bookshelves to see what books we have on hand that look good to read but that, for whatever reason, we have passed by. In some cases, these are books we’ve had for years. One she read and recommended to me was Betrayedby Stan Telchin. I read it a couple of weeks ago and am just getting around to the review.
It’s the story of a Jewish family, second generation Americans, who have settled into this country and given up the religious practice of Judaism for the cultural aspects. Their oldest daughter goes off to college in New York, falls under the influence of some Christians, and concludes that Jesus is the Jewish Messiah. The parents are outraged, as is the girl’s younger sister. The older girl challenged them all to at least look into it and come to their own conclusions.
Stan Telchin
After the initial outrage at their daughter’s betrayal, the book is the story of Stan’s study of the issue. After a search of scripture, both Old and New Testament, he concludes that his daughter is right: Jesus is the Messiah foretold by the prophets.
I won’t make this a long review. Telchin does an excellent job describing the toll all this took on the family, what he studied, what he concluded, and the final family reunification. It is an excellent, relatively short and easy read (less than 170 pages).
I give it 5-stars. But, alas, it will not stay on the bookshelf, as I don’t expect to ever read it again. Off it will go, probably to be given to someone rather than just donated.
Here is a good write-up about the book and the journey it describes at the website “Jewish Testimonies”.
