There must be at least a hundred stories in this picture. Anybody got one? You can use as many words as you like (but try to stay under 2500). Just post your story on your own blog and hop over here and put the link in the “Comments” section below. The challenge will end next Wednesday, September 30, at midnight U. S. Central Time. Hope a lot of you take part.
Please remember, this site is G-rated. Thanks.
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Set Free To Love, the first novel in my Smoky Mountain Series is currently on sale at Amazon’s Kindle store for just $.99. The regular price of $3.99 has been suspended for the next 7 days.
Book two in the series, Cameron’s Rib, is now available on Amazon, and book number three, Repaired By Love, will be available next week. Book number four, Jonah’s Song, should go digital in October, and book five, This Fire In My Heart, is still a bit of a mystery because it isn’t completely finished yet.
Amazon will run the sale on Set Free To Love until midnight September 16th, U.S. Pacific Time. I hope several of you take advantage of the special price to check out the series and get to know all the wonderful people who populate the other books as well.
Just follow the link to read more about the story and learn a little about how the series was birthed.
I also want to say a big THANK YOU to all of you readers who have read books 1 and 2. I’m so thrilled that you were blessed by them.
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Cinquain:
It calls my name;
I lay down other work;
I rush to do its bidding well.
Enslaved.
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Cinquain:
A tiny piece,
Yet often large in scope.
American, yet cousin to
Haiku.
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Cinquain:
I love this form!
Somehow it feels my soul
And gives me art with which to share
My heart.
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Decided to visit some poems from my past. I had almost forgotten about writing some of these, so I dusted them off and stuck them into a brand new post for all the readers who are new to my site in the past couple of years. Hope you enjoy them.
WELL, I’LL BE BLOGGED!
I think I have a lot to say —
Too much to finish in one day.
If I record a daily log,
I’ll have the skeleton of a total blog.
And if I flesh that skeleton out
And give it life, I have no doubt
Readers will gather round about
And greet each shining post with joyful shout.
I’ll shock the timid, cheer the sad,
Enrage the liberal and make him mad,
And all I write, be it good or bad,
To cyberspace my own two cents will add.
A POEM WITH ONLY FOUR VOWELS
Sometimes I write too long.
Sometimes I write too short.
Sometimes I write to make a point.
Sometimes I write for sport.
Now WordPress challenged me
To write a post that’s strange.
Cannot be done the easy way.
I have to make a change.
They say but twenty-five
Of letters are allowed.
And if I’m brave, they then advise
That I leave out a vowel!
So in this little poem,
One vowel I’ll avoid.
I hope it won’t be sorely missed,
And my good name destroyed.
Let’s see, what can I choose?
There’s only five to start.
Oh, my, this is a challenge real.
WordPress, please have a heart!
Okay, I’ve made my choice.
So happy I can be.
The vowel I’ve chosen to ignore
Lives between ‘T’ and ‘V’.
CONTEMPLATIONS ON LEONARDO DA VINCI’S THE LAST SUPPER
Behold the blessed, holy convocation,
Preserved for us to ponder as we gaze.
In transient elements, the artist painted
Eternal substance; impartations that amaze.
We look upon the faces art has captured
As loved disciples try to understand
The Master’s words; He speaks of sacrifices
And of His blood and body freely given for man.
Their eyes – so full of love, yet consternation,
Trying to grasp full meaning of this meal.
All other Passovers remembered history,
But now the sacrifice sits here with them, so real.
In colors both subdued and yet alive,
The artist welcomes me to come join in
Our Lord’s last supper and His revelation:
He’ll now go forth to pay the price for all my sin.
BORED
I am bored … so bored.
I need something else to do.
Wrack my brain … the pain.
What will help? Don’t have a clue.
Talk on phone … endless drone.
Do my nails until they gleam.
Clean desk drawer … fun chore:
Found lost candy and hand cream.
Still I’m bored … so bored.
Without something else to try,
I’ll have no choice … guilty voice:
Must start my real work by and by.
REQUIEM
What? You ask how was this keyboard
Torn asunder piece by piece?
I admit it was my doing:
Thought perhaps my pain ‘twould ease.
For I cannot find my music;
Cannot hear the melody.
Cannot feel the beat, the rhythm;
And, of course, no harmony.
Still, my soul keeps searching, reaching;
Won’t believe the gift is gone.
It once coursed throughout my being;
Every breath exhaled a song.
Every heartbeat set a tempo;
Notes cascaded from my mind;
Even in sleep, my dreams invaded —
Nocturnes delicate, sublime.
Now, I’ve only fleeting memories
Of creating symphonies.
Tragedy beyond my bearing:
There’s no music left in me!
LONGING FOR THEM NOW
Bright flashes of blissful moments,
Fluttering pages of Christmas memories.
Drifting through my mind.
Pages of memories of childhood beam
With living, expectant Christmas dreams.
Longing for them now.
Remembering how each page was able to ignite
My imagination, which brought each one to life.
Oh happy, happy days!
Bright daydreams & wishes,
Make-believing magic,
Found within the pages –
The Christmas catalogs.
A Quiver Full of Arrows, one of my most recent inspirational digital novels is going on sale. Beginning Saturday, August 29, you can buy ‘Quiver’ for only $.99.
The sale lasts for 72 hours (beginning 8:00 a.m. U.S. Pacific Time):
All day Saturday, Sunday, and Monday.
On Tuesday, the price increases to $1.99 — which is still a pretty good deal.
Then on Friday, the book goes back to it’s regular price of $2.99
If you’re looking for a wholesome story with captivating characters that will melt your heart — if you’re looking for a story that reminds you God cares about and has solutions for our everyday problems in our everyday lives — if you’re looking for a story that has a slightly surprising, but well-deserved happy ending — then this is the book for you.
You can read a description of the story and get more information by visiting the book’s page at Amazon’s Kindle Store.
And if you don’t have a Kindle or an iPad or iPhone, you can download a free app from Amazon that will let you use your desktop or laptop as an e-reader.
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I do love trees!!!!! If you love trees, visit Cee’s blog to take part in today’s challenge. For this challenge Cee accepts photos in black & white, sepia, or limited selective color (with most of the picture in black & white). I got a little carried away with experimentation on a couple, but maybe I can squeeze by and not get disqualified.
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The gun.
I must work fast.
I’ll have to hide it well.
At least the deed is fin’lly done.
I’m free.
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Your hair!
It’s a new cut?
What do you call that style?
What do I think? Well – uh – I’d say –
Unique!
*
Dasies
Are happy flowers.
My very favorites.
Bright white petals; sunshine middles.
Pure joy.
*
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Just got to thinking today that so many of our stories have characteristics and qualities that are both generic and universal. I decided to experiment a little with writing a story using nonsense terms instead of normal nouns and verbs. I’m certain you will be able to understand the story with very little trouble. It was fun, and I think it helps focus on the fact that sometimes it isn’t just choosing the right word that matters. It’s how we put those words together into a setting that gets the job done.
THE BONDO DELAFOR
The young delafor wandered through the cogem, wishing he could find a delafora to be his rhuba. He’d heard the fonders tell of bondo delafors who had won the hands of delaforas by zonering the terrible goganbulls. He knew the goganbulls were threatening the cogem, and many delafors were terrizon of them. He didn’t know if he were bondo enough to zoner a goganbull or not, but he hoped he’d have a chance.
One day the great kinba of the cogem announced that a goganbull had been spotted just outside the cogem. The great kinba porsayed that he would give the most beautiful delafora to the delafor who zonered that goganbull.
So the young delafor raced to his stetsa, hopped on, and took off to find the goganbull and zoner it. When he found the goganbull, it was maxma! It was so maxma that the young delafor’s stetsa reared up, threw the delafor off, and ran away. Now the only thing the delafor had was his pontier. So he looked the goganbull in the eye, stood up straight and tall and shumed toward him. Keeping eye contact, he shumed all the way to within two feet of him. The goganbull gloamed and hot smeltz came from his buzzle.
But the young delafor rememberd the beautiful delafora who was porsayed by the great kinba. The delafor wanted that delafora for his rhuba very badly. So he aimed his pontier and shumed the last two feet toward the goganbull; then he flumed his pontier right into the goganbulls corva. With one horrible gloam, the goganbull fell over, and black smoke roold from his buzzle. Then all was quiet.
The young delafor took his pontier and whapped off the goganbull’s henda and carried it back to the great kinba. That day the young delafor won the most beautiful delafora in the cogem to be his very own rhuba. And they both lived schnookumy ever after.
TU FEND
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Readers often ask me how I came up with an idea for a story or for one particular character, and, of course, there are as many different answers as there are stories and characters. Many times ideas come from such ordinary situations and events that they aren’t particularly memorable, but, once in a while, there are some rather unusual circumstances involved. I consider the creation of the main character for Cameron’s Rib one of those unusual situations.
When I was writing the first novel in The Smoky Mountain Series – Set Free To Love – I had no intention of working on a series. In fact, to be quite honest, I didn’t like the idea of a series at all. So I wasn’t thinking of any of my characters in terms of giving them qualities that would make them long-lasting enough to travel through several stories. But since this series is an inspirational work, focused on faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, I feel I can thank the Lord sincerely for working in me to create characters who did have the right qualities for longevity, and I’m especially grateful where Pastor Cameron McDaniels is concerned.
You see, in book # 1, I had a love story developing, and, in the good old tradition of romance, I needed a second man to form a love triangle – temporarily. I decided that the pastor in the story – being single and about the right age – would fill the bill perfectly. He was supposed to have a rather important part to play in about three chapters, but after that, he was intended to fade away into the background.
But something happened along the way to fading him out. He just didn’t seem to fade. I put up with him for the rest of the story, and, in truth, he didn’t interfere too much, but you can only imagine my surprise when, by the time I was writing the last chapter of Set Free To Love, I suddenly had the seeds of a brand new story about the same people; only in this new story, Pastor Cameron McDaniels was the star!
Like any good writer, I had put the developing chapters of the first book into the hands of some people who would be able and willing to tell me honestly where the book had strengths and weaknesses. By the time those readers had neared the end, they all agreed that I simply could not allow the story to end with one book. They felt I was obligated to continue following the lives of the main characters so that readers could do so as well. And I have to admit that, by that time, I was so in love with these wonderful people I had created that I knew I wasn’t ready to let them go either.
But never had I imagined, even for one minute, that this “temporary extra” I had thrown in to facilitate my love triangle would literally take over the series.
Not only did he become the star of the second book in the series – to the point of having his name in the title (another deviation from my plans) – but he also became the only character from the first book who maintained a leading role in every book in the series.
Years before I started writing novels, I heard a writer say that characters often had a mind of their own, and that once a novel was started, it often began to write itself – turning out to be something other than the author’s original plan. I have to admit that I didn’t really believe that. Now, however, after writing ten complete novels and having three others in progress, I can testify to the fact that characters really do have a mind of their own, and a story can eventually take over and write itself into something more wonderful than the author originally imagined.
For myself, since I write mainly inspirational novels that help people know the Lord and His love in a practical way, I’m trusting that it’s the Lord Himself who takes over and develops my stories and characters to their fullest extent. And I’m truly grateful, because I can honestly say that many of my novels have turned out to be much richer and so much more satisfying than I imagined when I sat down to that keyboard.
I hope all of you who choose Cameron’s Rib will enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. I hope you fall in love with Pastor Cameron McDaniels and Suzanne Peterson. And, most of all, I hope their love story – and the truth about how much the Lord Himself cares about the love between a man and a woman – will encourage you in your own love story and your own life.
Get your copy of Cameron’s Rib downloaded today from Amazon’s Kindle store. And remember, if you don’t have an e-reader, Amazon offers a free app that will turn any desktop or laptop computer into an instant e-reader. (Of course, you can still find the printed version at St. Ellen Press.)
Happy Reading!
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Julia’s 100-Word Challenge this week is the prompt: “… but it was there just a moment ago …”
HEROINE
“But it was there just a moment ago,” Sonya insisted.
Gregor’s face distorted with anger and fear.
“I put it on your desk exactly as you instructed,” she said. “Honestly!”
“This office was locked, Sonya. Except for you, no one had entrance.”
Sonya circled the room, looking under furniture, rummaging file drawers, dumping wastebaskets. “Give me time; I’ll find it!”
He grabbed her by the throat. “To whom have you betrayed me?”
She stalled for time. In another hour, Interpol would have the information they needed to bring down this tyrant’s regime. Even if she had to die, it thrilled her to know she had made it all possible.
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Okay, now I’ve seen it all. I’m so fed up with all this “politically correct” crap (and I use that word because there’s only one other that would do the job better, but I don’t use that kind of language). I just bought a new notebook to record some Bible lesson notes in, and I have to admit that I didn’t read all the words on the front of said notebook before I purchased it. It looks like any number of others, with a colorful cover and 80 sheets of college-ruled paper inside.
But this morning, as I prepared to type the notes from it into the chapter of one of my books, I found myself reading the text in a little white box on the front. Here’s what it says: “Paper from responsible sources.”
Now just WHAT does that mean?????????
I’ll tell you what it says to me. It says that because society has gone bonkers about what they call “saving the earth,” and all of these “green” people insist on using only recycled materials, companies are now trying to look good in the eyes of those people. So I’m guessing that this company didn’t use recycled paper, so, of course, they can’t say “made from recycled paper.” But they want to sound to everyone as if they use recycled paper, so they say, “Paper from responsible sources.”
Now, I grant you that I may be totally wrong about this situation. I may have misjudged the company completely. But if I have, then I’d appreciate their telling me what “responsible sources” are. I mean, anyone who makes paper should be responsible for the paper they make. Any reputable paper manufacturer is responsible to provide good quality product and stand behind it.
So what’s the deal??????
And why am I making such a big deal out of it anyway?
Well, the answer to that last question is what I said in the first paragraph. I’m totally fed up with all this “politically correct” mania, and I think this situation just helps prove how totally ridiculous and also how worthless the whole concept is. Politically correct words and actions are hypocritical as often as they are genuine — no, actually, I believe they are hypocritical more often than they are genuine. And if we don’t recognize that fact soon, we are going to end up being the most deceived society of people who have ever lived on this earth.
Well, I guess I might have one other reason for making an issue of this subject: It gave me something different to blog about.
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The Happy Wordcrafter 