Welcome to Author Spotlight! Each week will feature a different author. We’ll get the scoop behind their writing life and dish a little. The authors will also be giving away a copy of their latest book. FUN.

The winner from last week’s Author Spotlight with Ann Shorey  JEAN BORSHEIM! Please email my assistant Christen with your mailing address. (ckrumm@litfusegroup.com)

This week please welcome Catherine West in the spotlight! To win a copy her book Hidden in the Heart (OakTara, 2012) , leave a comment on this post.

Share a little bit about yourself. Married with kids? Empty nester? Do you work full-time and write when you can squeeze it in?

Thanks for having me as your guest, Suzanne! Yes, I’ve been happily married for almost 27 years now, to the most wonderful man in the world! Our two children are now grown, and our daughter is about to get married in May! Our son studies music at Berklee in Boston. We’ve enjoyed the empty nest, but this summer after the wedding, our daughter and her new hubby will be moving home to Bermuda, so I’m looking forward to spending more time with them, as they’ve been living in Canada.

And share something about your writing. What’s your genre(s), your areas of interest…

I am a lover of all things romance! I love writing romance. All my books will have a fairly strong element of romance in them, even if they aren’t classified as a straight romance. My stories are contemporary, and lately I’ve been writing what I would call ‘family sagas’. Big, meaty books with lots of colorful characters and subplots.

How did you get started writing? Did you have a dream of being a published author?

I’ve always loved to write. I remember writing my first ‘romance’ when I was in high school. Thought I was quite grown up! LOL! That got me hooked, and I always had some kind of story on the go. I never really considered the possibility of becoming a published author until much later, once I was at home with my kids. Of course that was a busy time for me, so my writing was sporadic, but when they went off to school, I got serious about it and started to investigate exactly how I would go about getting published. This was actually a couple years before the birth of the Internet, so it was more difficult, especially living in Bermuda. Once the Internet came along, a whole new world opened for me! I found RWA and ACFW, and I was really able to learn my craft. Until then, I didn’t have a clue what I was doing. It was no wonder those first few editors rejected my offerings!

After you started writing seriously–how long was it before you were published?

Many, many, many years! I can’t even remember now how many exactly. I did put my writing on hold for a few years, but I guess I wrote off and on for about fifteen years before I finally became agented. It was about another four years before my first novel was contracted.

Aside from a cup of good, strong coffee, what helps you get all of your “brain cylinders” firing so you can write well? Do you have any favorite places and routines when you write? How many hours a day do you spend writing?

Ah, yes, the coffee is a must! We have a home office that I use to do my most serious writing, when I’m in the middle of a story and don’t want to be disturbed. I enjoy the couch in the family room as well. ☺ At home, I can really write anywhere. I find it more difficult to write out in public, so you won’t find me parked in a coffee shop working away any time soon. Too many distractions. As for inspiration, books I’ve read, news articles and well-written television all help to get my wheels turning! A typical day for me, (when I’m not focusing on a wedding), would be about four to five hours, more perhaps if I sneak in some evening time. It really depends what I’m working on. These days, however, let’s just say it is a good thing I am not on a deadline! I will get back to my routine this summer. ☺

What has been the biggest help to you in the journey to publication? Writers’ conferences? Writing groups? Your mom as your first draft reader?

Without a doubt, I don’t think I would be published today were it not for American Christian Fiction Writers. The critique groups I have been part of, the mentors who’ve encouraged me along the way and all the wonderful friends I’ve made through this group have all been instrumental in my journey. I try not to miss a conference if possible, the networking is vital for me as far as keeping me focused on my goals and encouraging me to push forward, and of course the teaching is invaluable. I don’t think a writer can ever stop learning and I’m so grateful to know this conference is available to us!

Is the “writer’s life” what you thought it would be?

I’m not sure I had any fixed ideas about what it would be like! I’ve been fortunate to be a stay-at-home Mom, so life tends to go on around me and I’ve learned to balance the kids, the husband and the house and the dog with my writing life. Of course it’s much easier now that I only have the husband and the dog to worry about!

What are your biggest distractions?

Facebook, Facebook, Facebook… You could call me an addict. I love it. When I really have to do something or get a couple chapters written or write an interview…I need to ‘go dark’. Otherwise I’ll be checking it, checking my email, that’s another big one for me…I wouldn’t say I have ADD but I am definitely easily distracted!

What was one of the best moments in your career and what was one of the worst?

Oh, this one I have to answer in reverse order! The worst moment was when my agent persuaded me to put the book of my heart on the shelf. It was the book she contracted me with. She loved the story, I loved the story. We worked hard on it. I worked with two outside editors on it, because I wanted to be sure I was putting the best work out there. And yet, we couldn’t sell it. None of the big CBA publishers were interested in a romance that took place against the backdrop of The Vietnam War. Go figure. ☺ So, as heartbreaking as it was for me, I put that book aside and worked on my next novel. But that story wouldn’t let me go. Eventually I asked my agent if it’d be okay if we tried other avenues, perhaps smaller publishers.

And then came the best moment of my career. ☺ I sent that story, Yesterday’s Tomorrow, to Ramona Tucker at OakTara. She loved it as much as we did. In March 2011, the book of my heart was published. And I learned a valuable lesson. Timing, God’s timing, is everything.

What do you least like about being a writer? Most like?

Hmm. I have to say I don’t like the pressure I put on myself. I’m always wondering how I can do more, sell more, get the word out…etc…it’s emotionally draining. I’m trying really hard this year to just do what I can and be satisfied with that. I’m not superwoman. I’m not Karen Kingsbury. I need to be okay with that. I also don’t enjoy the misconceptions people seem to have of being a published author. I’m always being asked when my next book is coming out. They seem to think it’s an automatic given that once you’ve been published, you’ll just keep popping books out year after year. Unfortunately, it doesn’t work that way!

What is the role and importance of an agent?

These days, with very few houses even considering an un-represented author, I say an agent is vital. A good agent. I’ve heard some horror stories, and while I don’t know any bad agents personally, I know they exist. Do your homework before you start querying agents. An agent will work for you because they love what you do. You need to love your agent and they need to love you. It’s important to have an agent that you trust, that you can communicate openly with and rely on to guide you through issues in the publishing world that you might not have a clue about!

What advice would you give to new writers?

I always say, if writing is the path God has put you on, stick to it. It’s discouraging, it’s hard, but it’s truly worth it if it is where you know you’re supposed to be. Study the craft, go to conferences if you can, find good critique partners and never, ever, give up!

Pretend I’m a customer at a bookstore looking for a good book. Give me a one or two sentence promo to convince me to buy your book.

You existed before you were adopted. But what if the woman who gave you life doesn’t want to be found?

What’s on the book horizon for you?

How I wish I knew! At the moment we’re shopping a couple of projects, one romance and the other a family saga…so we’ll see what happens there. I’m continuing to write while I wait, and that’s about all I can tell you!

Last question, how can readers find you and your books?

Website
Facebook
OakTara Website
Blog
GoodReads

Amazon Links:

Yesterday’s Tomorrow

Hidden in the Heart

Welcome to Author Spotlight! Each week will feature a different author. We’ll get the scoop behind their writing life and dish a little. The authors will also be giving away a copy of their latest book. FUN.

The winner from last week’s Author Spotlight with Valerie Weaver-Zercher in the spotlight is Naomi Martin! Please email my assistant Christen with your mailing address. (ckrumm@litfusegroup.com)

This week please welcome Ann Shorey in the spotlight! To win a copy her book When the Heart Heals (Revell, 2013), leave a comment on this post.
Share a little bit about yourself. Married with kids? Empty nester? Do you work full-time and write when you can squeeze it in?

I’ve been married for twenty-two years to the best husband in the world. We’re empty nesters who lavish affection on our dog, Amber, when our grown daughters aren’t available. I’m blessed to be able to write full-time.

And share something about your writing. What’s your genre(s), your areas of interest…

I love history and historical fiction, so that translates to my writing. Currently I’m writing in the Historical Romance genre.

How did you get started writing? Did you have a dream of being a published author?

My dream of being an author started way back in high school, but wiser heads told me I needed to find a way to actually make a living. Fast forward a few decades to the days after my late husband died. Our children were already out on their own. I’d always wanted to write, and now had the time to fulfill my dream. So I took classes, devoured Writers Digest, and attended conferences.

I first wrote a nonfiction family history, then took inspiration from family stories and began to write novels in 2001.

After you started writing seriously–how long was it before you were published?

My first novel was accepted by Revell in 2007 and released in 2009.

Aside from a cup of good, strong coffee, what helps you get all of your “brain cylinders” firing so you can write well? Do you have any favorite places and routines when you write? How many hours a day do you spend writing?

The good, strong coffee is #1—there’s a cup sitting on my desk right now. Aside from caffeine, prayer is my first stop before writing. Once I commit my words to the Lord, and seek His help for the day’s output, I sit down and get busy. I write for four or five hours a day in my home office—with my dog keeping me company beside my desk.

What has been the biggest help to you in the journey to publication? Writers’ conferences? Writing groups? Your mom as your first draft reader?

For me, it’s been writer’s conferences. Between the classes and the networking, they’re the best investment of my time and finances. I started with attending conferences in my home state, and then branched out to traveling to conferences out of state. The ACFW Annual Conference is my hands-down favorite.

What are your biggest distractions?

Email and Facebook are huge distractions. I have to turn off my email to really focus on writing.

What do you least like about being a writer? Most like?

The toughest part is having to say no to participating in family activities that come up when I’m on a tight deadline. The thing I enjoy the most is spending time creating characters and stories. What fun!

What is the role and importance of an agent?

My agent is Tamela Hancock Murray. I love how she’s there for me. One of the most important aspects of being agented, and Tamela does this perfectly, is having someone between me and the publisher who will handle my questions and concerns.

What advice would you give to new writers?

First of all, don’t get discouraged and quit. Find a good critique group of serious writers and pay attention to their suggestions. Be willing to delete even your most golden words if they detract from your story.

Pretend I’m a customer at a bookstore looking for a good book. Give me a one or two sentence promo to convince me to buy your book.

If you enjoy stories about unconventional heroines, you’ll love When the Heart Heals. The main character, Rosemary, is a nurse in a time when nursing was not an acceptable profession for young, unmarried women.

What’s on the book horizon for you?

The next novel in the Sisters at Heart series is coming out in early 2014, and I’m busy with edits, cover design, and all the other fun stuff that goes with a book release. Additionally, I have a novella included in a collection with authors Jane Kirkpatrick, Amanda Cabot and Laurie Alice Eakes. The release date is mid-2014. This will be Revell’s first venture into the novella field, so it’s exciting to be part of the process.

Last question, how can readers find you and your books?

My website is www.annshorey.com. Readers can find my contact information there. Additionally, find me on Facebook.
Please check your local bookstore for my books—if they don’t have them in stock, I know they’ll be happy to order a copy for you.
My website has direct links to several online retailers, including Amazon.com and Christianbook.com: http://www.annshorey.com/novels.html

Thank you for sharing your writing life with my bleaders! (blog + readers = bleaders)

Thank you for inviting me, Suzanne! It’s been a pleasure.

Welcome to Author Spotlight! Each week will feature a different author. We’ll get the scoop behind their writing life and dish a little. The authors will also be giving away a copy of their latest book. FUN.

The winner from last week’s Author Spotlight with Lisa T. Bergren is Betti Mace! Please email my assistant Christen with your mailing address. (ckrumm@litfusegroup.com)

This week please welcome Valerie Weaver-Zercher in the spotlight! To win a copy her book Thrill of the Chaste (The Johns Hopkins University Press 2013), leave a comment on this post

Share a little bit about yourself. Married with kids? Empty nester? Do you work full-time and write when you can squeeze it in?

I am married and have three sons, ages 12, 10, and 8. I am a freelance editor and do developmental editing and copyediting work for a variety of publishers and individual authors. In addition to writing Thrill of the Chaste: The Allure of Amish Romance Novels, I write book reviews, features, and essays for a variety of publications. I love both writing and editing, and try to maintain some balance between the two.

And share something about your writing. What’s your genre(s), your areas of interest…

In addition to more academic or analytical nonfiction, I enjoy writing creative nonfiction and memoir. Frankly, I love to combine a journalistic approach to a topic with personal narrative writing, so that the prose ping-pongs back and forth between an investigation into some issue and my own experience of that issue. I also enjoy writing review essays that examine two or more books that revolve around the same topic.

How did you get started writing? Did you have a dream of being a published author?

I have enjoyed writing ever since I was in elementary school. My first job out of college (after a year abroad) was in editing, and it gave me the chance to write editorials and features and news articles. That first job was invaluable in terms of teaching me to write in a disciplined way, and under deadline! It also gave me critical experience in the editing side of the publishing equation; now that I have editors editing my writing, I understand and appreciate their role more than I would have had I not had that first job.

After you started writing seriously–how long was it before you were published?

That first editorial job gave me the opportunity to publish short pieces, and it gave me the confidence to keep submitting pieces for publication even after I had moved on to other jobs and to graduate school. Only after I had kids, however, did I begin to take myself more seriously as a writer and start treating it as a vocation that I wanted to pursue rather than just a hobby to be dabbled in. I don’t think I started really seeing myself as a writer until a few years ago, actually. It was much safer to call myself an “editor” or a “mother” than a “writer.”

Aside from a cup of good, strong coffee, what helps you get all of your “brain cylinders” firing so you can write well? Do you have any favorite places and routines when you write? How many hours a day do you spend writing?

I usually write in my basement study. (This room, which we remodeled a few years ago into my study, is likely different from most home offices in that it is, shall we say, a “multipurpose” room. There are a toilet and a sink in one corner! Our house was built in the 1960s, and we assume that the original owners decided to add a toilet in case they ever added a whole bathroom. We have simply put bookshelves up in front of it to hide it from view.) Anyway: I write best by myself—i.e., not in a coffee shop and not when my kids are home. I don’t have to have a beautiful place to write: just a computer, a desk, a chair, and some quiet.

What has been the biggest help to you in the journey to publication? Writers’ conferences? Writing groups? Your mom as your first draft reader?

Although I had already been publishing by the time we began meeting, my writing group has been invaluable in terms of helping me learn to revise. The women in my group are incredibly intelligent, careful, and compassionate critics and teachers of writing, and they offer helpful feedback whenever I show them a piece of my writing.

Is the “writer’s life” what you thought it would be? 

I don’t think I anticipated how much I would love the writing life. It is much more difficult than almost anything I’ve done, but also much more absorbing and lovely than most activities that fill my life. When I am in the middle of a large writing project, the time passes extremely quickly and I am surprised and saddened when the end of my work day arrives.

What are your biggest distractions?

Apart from raising kids and keeping a household running (someone always seems to be getting sick, and the laundry always accumulates way too fast), my biggest distraction these days is worrying about how my book is being received. I am very distracted by reading reviews of my work, scheduling interviews and signings, and worrying about whether people like my book. My tendency is to become the epitome of the needy-writer stereotype, and I’ve really had to work on separating myself from those extrinsic rewards and criticisms. I’m slowly learning to focus on the work of writing itself rather than people’s responses to it.

What do you least like about being a writer? Most like?

One of the difficult things for me about being a writer is that it’s such a private, at-home activity that many people who know me don’t really know what I do. That is, people at church and friends and acquaintances aren’t necessarily reading the things I write or edit, so I think they sometimes wonder what I do all day! Freelance writing and editing is also difficult in that the payments I receive for various jobs are quite inconsistent, and so it’s hard to plan on any specific monthly income. There also aren’t the usual “perks” of a regular job—health and retirement benefits, tech support, raises, and a supervisor to help you figure out how to do your work better,

Having said that, I feel incredibly privileged to be able to do the work that I most love to do in the world. Being able to devote some daytime hours to writing, rather than only after the kids are in bed, feels like a gift.

What advice would you offer to new writers?

I have found getting published to be an incredibly slow process of accruing contacts and confidence and skills. Frankly, I would not recommend it to the faint of heart! Learning to just keep writing and to remain hopeful in the face of rejections is akin to a spiritual discipline. In fact, writing often feels like a spiritual practice to me. So I guess I’d say: approach writing with care, cautious joy, and fear and trembling!

Pretend I’m a customer at a bookstore looking for a good book. Give me a one or two sentence promo to convince me to buy your book.

A new Amish romance novel appeared on the market at the rate of one every four days in 2012. Ten years earlier, only two new Amish novels were published. What has changed between then and now? Thrill of the Chaste: The Allure of Amish Romance Novels explores why Amish-themed fiction is so incredibly popular. If you find yourself curious about why so many people are curious about the Amish, you will enjoy this book.

Last question, how can readers find you and your books?

Thrill of the Chaste is available for purchase on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and the Johns Hopkins University Press website.

Welcome to Author Spotlight! Each week will feature a different author. We’ll get the scoop behind their writing life and dish a little. The authors will also be giving away a copy of their latest book. FUN.

The winner from last week’s Author Spotlight with Melanie Dobson is Sharon (sami***7)! Please email my assistant Christen with your mailing address. (ckrumm@litfusegroup.com)

This week please welcome Lisa T. Bergren in the spotlight! To win a copy of the newest book in her Grand Tour Series, Grave Consequences (David C. Cook 2013), leave a comment on this post

Share a little bit about yourself. Married with kids? Empty nester? Do you work full-time and write when you can squeeze it in?

Married for 21 years to Tim, my best friend. Our eldest of three is our first to leave the next this fall, when she goes to college. *sniff* *snort* I write when they’re all away at school.

And share something about your writing. What’s your genre(s), your areas of interest…

I write in many genres. I’ve written over 40 books–children’s, teen fiction, devotional, nonfiction, spiritual suspense, women’s fiction, contemporary romance. I often ask people what they like to read because I can pretty much come close to most reader’s favorite genres, except for sci fi.

After you started writing seriously–how long was it before you were published?

A year. God was gracious and opened a door, and then kept on opening doors…

Aside from a cup of good, strong coffee, what helps you get all of your “brain cylinders” firing so you can write well? Do you have any favorite places and routines when you write? How many hours a day do you spend writing?

I like to fill my head with good, thought-provoking nonfiction. Often those themes that God wants me to work on myself, creep into my novels. You write what you know, right? In regard to routine, I’ll not write for a month or two, then write five days a week for a month to get a decent rough draft done. I’m fast, once my research is done and I get my rear-end into a chair to concentrate. I always write at the library, hardly ever at home.

What has been the biggest help to you in the journey to publication? Writers’ conferences? Writing groups? Your mom as your first draft reader?

Reading WRITER’S DIGEST and going to writer’s conferences.

What are your biggest distractions?

Facebook and Twitter.

What do you least like about being a writer? Most like?

I least like the roller-coaster finances. I most like the flexibility.

What is the role and importance of an agent?

Steve Laube is my agent, and he’s a great sounding board and brainstormer. With publishing’s constantly shifting sands, I wouldn’t want to be without a good agent.

What advice would you give to new writers?

Read a ton of what you love, and then write THAT. Not what you think you should write, but what you can’t NOT write. Passion shows, regardless of genre.

Pretend I’m a customer at a bookstore looking for a good book. Give me a one or two sentence promo to convince me to buy your book.

Like “Downton Abbey?” You should check out my series about a group of Americans in Europe in 1913 on the Grand Tour…

What’s on the book horizon for you?

Rewrite of GLITTERING PROMISES, book 3 in the Grand Tour Series; edits on REMNANTS: SEASON OF WONDER (1st in a new YA trilogy); rough draft of the second REMNANTS; DELUGE, the fifth installment in the River of Time. And all that by end of June! Then, vacation and rest, and REMNANTS #3….

Last question, how can readers find you and your books?

www.LisaBergren.com; Facebook.com/LisaTawnBergren; @LisaTBergren

Most bookstores should have at least a copy of one of my books on their shelves, but if not, they can order it for you. Support your local bookstore! And if that doesn’t work, you can always find my books on Amazon, B&N, CBD, etc, etc.