Eight Questions (a blog hop!)

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Today, I'm participating in my first-ever blog hop, invited by Jordyn Redwood, author of medical suspense novels. If you're an author (published or not) and would like to participate, leave me a comment with your e-mail address and I'll link to you here. Your post must be set for Jan 10, 2013.

It's simple: answer these questions about your current WIP.

1. What is the working title of your book?


Do No Harm

 

2. Where did the idea come from for the book?


I made a commitment to myself early in 2012 to to finally do something I've dreamed about since childhood: write a novel. Since I have a fulltime day job that takes up way too much of my time, I decided to use things I had some personal experience with, while purposefully making it not be a book about me. So I started from some church conflicts that I experienced when we first moved to Texas from up north, and built from there.

 

3. What genre does your book fall under?


Women's fiction–I suppose it would be inspirational women's fiction.

 

4. What's the synopsis of your book?


 Do No Harm is the story of a disgraced Seattle obstetrician whose efforts to fit into her new Texas home are stymied by family conflicts, cultural differences, church politics, and ghosts from her past.

 

5. Will our book be self-published or represented by an agency?


I hope to have it traditionally published, but I'm a first-time novelist and have no agent yet. I do have dreams of someday signing with a particular agent who I've admired for about 25 years. At the 2012 ACFW conference in Dallas I was fortunate to meet her briefly, and after reading my opening pages she asked me to send her the manuscript when it's completed. So I'm working hard to get it in shape to send to her, hopefully by the end of January. 

 

6. How long did it take you to write the first draft of your manuscript?


I wrote the first words back in February 2012, although the idea's been floating around in the back of my mind for several years.

 

7. What other books would you compare this story to within your genre?

This one's tough for me. Perhaps Need You Now by Beth Wiseman, or maybe The Church Ladies by Lisa Samson.

 

8. What else about your book might pique a reader's interest?


If you've ever been hurt by “church people,” you might find this book interesting.  

Jordyn– thanks so much for allowing me to participate in this parade.

Check back to see who else will be participating in the blog hop next week.
 
Laura
Greenville, Texas
I Was Just Thinking . . .
Legal Blog: Real Estate Law Blog
Twitter: @LauraMcMom
Email me

Changes Coming – Will You Follow Me?

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Image 179256 courtesy Dreamstime.com
I've been mostly absent for the last few weeks from social media. Insanely busy at work, desperately trying to fulfill my goal/dream of finishing the first draft of my first novel by the end of the year, dealing with family “stuff.” But changes are coming in 2013, and I hope and intend to be more present, contributing more to the lives of the people in my life, including you. More about all that in the days/weeks to come.

In the meantime, I wanted to let those of you who read this blog in on one exciting bit of news. I'm taking a huge (well, huge for me) leap and launching my own website very soon. I've seen the first “draft” of the design and . . . well . . . I love it. I hope others will, too. The new site should launch the first week of January.

Why should you care? Well, my blog will be moving to the new site when it launches. As I understand it, people who currently follow my blog (whether via email or via RSS feed or through the Blogger “follow” feature) will not automatically become followers of the blog at its new home. So if you want to stay in the conversation, when the time comes, you'll have to actually take a small step to follow me there. I'll provide more information about exactly how to do that in the very near future. I understand it's a very simple process.

I hope you will stick with me. The reason I write is to connect with you.

In the meantime, merry Christmas!

Laura
Greenville, Texas
I Was Just Thinking . . . 
Legal Blog: Real Estate Law Blog
Twitter: @LauraMcMom
Email me

Book Review (& FREE BOOK): You Don’t Know Me by Susan May Warren

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“To all who know her, Annalise Decker is a model wife and mother. She's a permanent member of the PTA, never misses a sporting event, and is constantly campaigning for her husband's mayoral race.“

So begins the back-cover copy for Susan May Warren's latest novel, You Don't Know Me (Tyndale House 2012). But Annalise Decker has a secret. One that she's kept for twenty years–kept from the small town that idealizes her family, from her children, and even from her husband. None of them knows that Annalise Decker really is Deidre O'Reilly, relocated as a troubled teen in the federal witness protection program after testifying against a vicious criminal who killed her friend and beat her nearly to death.

Twenty years later, Annalise's secret past has come back to threaten her and everything she cares about. The man she helped put behind bars is free, and is coming to get his revenge. Annalise faces an impossible choice: stay, and put her family at risk, or leave them behind to protect them. She's always known that she didn't deserve this perfect life, but how can she give it up?

I struggle to find the words to convey the impact of this novel. The story is engrossing–I found myself racing through chapters, heart pounding, to find out what was going to happen to these people. But this is not some mere suspense novel. The danger threatening the Decker family is just the surface story, albeit a well written one that keeps the reader holding her breath and turning pages. But Warren goes deeper, looking behind the suspense plot to examine the secrets we all keep and the lies we all tell, and the way those secrets and lies, big and small, isolate us from each other. Because Annalise is not the only one in her family with secrets to hide. I came away from the story with a fresh awareness that while not all of our secrets and lies will get us literally killed, they still can kill our souls (and our relationships) little by little, over time.

Annalise and her family felt more like real people than just characters in a novel. I especially could relate to Annalise's struggles with self-doubt and a feeling that everything she has is so much more than she deserves. When all the secrets and lies start to come to light, the results are everything she's always feared–and more than she ever could have imagined. I cried as I read the last chapters.

You Don't Know Me is a brilliantly told story, and an important book, one that I want to see everybody read. So much so that I'm going to give away my copy (autographed to me by the author last summer at a writing conference) to a reader of this blog. See below for how to get a chance to win.

This is one of the best novels I read in 2012. A great read, certainly. A well written suspense story. But even more than that, it's that very rare commodity: a novel that could change your life. If you let it.

If you'd like a chance to receive a free copy of this book, please leave a comment below. Tell my why you'd like to receive it, and share something about your favorite book of 2012. I'll send my copy to one lucky commenter in January.

If you don't win the free copy (or if you can't wait until January to read it), you can pick up your own copy at Amazon. Click on the cover image above. To learn more about Susan May Warren and her other writing, visit her website.

Laura
Greenville, Texas
I Was Just Thinking . . . 
Legal Blog: Real Estate Law Blog
Twitter: @LauraMcMom
Email me