Mouse’s Christmas Gift: A Review and Giveaway by Sally Matheny

Tis the Season Tis the season to savor excellent Christmas books! This week you’re in for a treat with a review of MOUSE’S CHIRSTMAS GIFT. To top it off, we have an autographed giveaway copy.  Fa-la-la-la-la, la-la, la-la! Review When Parson gets sick, the village’s Christmas Eve service is cancelled. But, one tiny church mouse doesn’t […]

Always Winter and Never Christmas

Those of us who celebrate the birth of Christ at this time of year are being distracted by the goodies of this world. Stuff. Celebration. Santa. Food. And more stuff.
But what about Christmas?

CHRISTMAS 2020 – CELEBRATE! by Jean Hall

I’m baking. The wonderful aromas of spices, vanilla & chocolates fill my house. My kitchen is a big mess with flour & sugar everywhere. Chocolate chips & sprinkles decorate my island. My little freezer is bulging with the goodies I’m making to share with the people I love. It’s my thing. Baking and cooking delicious […]

Always Winter and Never Christmas

 A few years ago I was doing some shopping in our local mall (formerly the largest in the nation, at a time when malls were a new concept.) I, of course, expected to see the typical Santa scene, with lines of tots waiting to sit on the lap of this fatherly figure to share their […]

Light in the Darkness

I’m usually an optimistic person, but lately it’s become more and more difficult for me to muster optimism as I read the newspaper or watch the evening news. Even my Facebook and Twitter feeds are not immune to the avalanche of bad news. Headlines and links are posted in real time as the events occur—the […]

Showing Christmas Using the Five Senses

Show; don’t tell. We hear it all the time. Don’t tell the reader, show the reader. Draw readers into your story. Make it easy for them to feel as if they’re in the middle of whatever you’re writing. Prompted by a recent series of blog posts on the Hartline Literary Agency website, I’ve been thinking […]

Christmas Reflections—Benefits of Christian Writing

For me, this has been one of my best Christmases ever, though you probably wouldn’t have guessed it: My daughter’s family lives in North Carolina, and they spent Christmas with her husband’s family again, where there are plenty of children of all ages for the grandchildren to play with. Our unofficially adopted daughter who lives […]