My Thanks

Sometimes—ok, a lot—I get discouraged in the writing life. That’s when I need the reality of those who walk this road ahead of me. What a blessing that writers such as Brandilyn Collins, Randy Ingermanson, and the various contributors to the Charis Connection blog share the ups and downs of their own writing lives with the rest of us.

When Lori Copeland talks about a typical writing day—one where life gets in the way of words on the page—it helps me chill out and take things as they come. Apparently being published and having your kids out of the house doesn’t banish life from eating away at writing time. So I must learn to cope, sooner rather than later.

When Randy Ingermanson (in his wonderful e-zine, Advanced Fiction Writing) and Brandilyn Collins (on her blog, Forensics and Faith) confess that by the time they turn in a manuscript, they hate it, I don’t feel so discouraged about the novels sitting in the top of my closet, read and revised so many times that I can’t stand the thought of them.

When Deborah Raney talks of unplanned plotting, and Liz Curtis Higgs writes of the joy in the actual writing of our unique stories, I am able to take a deep breath and simply move to the next scene, the next chapter of whatever is before me.

So to all of these authors, and many more I’ve met and read, I want to say Thank You. Thank you for being honest, for not maintaining a shroud of secrecy over the hard things, and for encouraging one more writer not to quit.