The question I get asked more than any other is: How do you come up with ideas? The answer is through interesting news stories that I’ve tucked away. After all, truth is always stranger—or more memorable–than fiction, right? Here’s an example: Years ago, I heard an amazing story about a pastor and a church in Texas. On a Sunday morning, Bishop Aaron Blake challenged his small congregation with a powerful question. “Brothers and sisters,” he said, “there are about 30,000 children in the foster care system in Texas and nearly a half a million in the U.S. Who will stand with me to defend, care, and support abused, abandon, and neglected children in our community?” After a brief moment of silence, one lady rose to her feet. “Pastor,” she said, “I will.” Then another family stood up, and another, and another. Twelve years later, their Texas county has more than enough foster families to meet the need. That story inspired the plot for my novel Stitches in Time. The new and improved Luke Schrock, now a deacon, poses the same question to the Amish church of Stoney Ridge. Schoolteacher Mollie Graber is the first to raise her hand. Weeks later,…

In my late-twenties, I went through a terrible time where I suffered insomnia, depression, and anxiety and ended up in intensive psychotherapy. I began going through flashbacks of sexual abuse I’d suffered as a child while living in various foster care situations. I began keeping a journal to maintain my sanity. I felt that if I could write a few sentences a day, I would not go mad. The journal entries gradually morphed into short stories. One of those stories was about a traumatized girl who is being used without her knowledge and a transient boy who is abused and photographed by an older man. The story just kept getting longer and longer. I was terrified. Terrified of the subject matter, but also terrified because I didn’t know how to write a novel. So, my starting point was traumatic memory. The adult me was grappling with how and why the boy had ended up there. I posed myself some questions: why would a boy be lured by this older man? What would be the appeal? What would he be fleeing, what were his vulnerabilities and how would the perpetrator seduce him and convince him to stay? I wrote the book…

There have been some changes occurring in the Cullen household over the past year or so. When you have children, you think they will never grow up and that they will never move out on their own. I believe most parents, like me, feel that parenthood just goes on and on in an endless loop. Recently, two of my three children have moved out. Moved on. They’re ADULTING. And I couldn’t be prouder of both of them. They’re actually doing it! Taking the examples my husband and I set, the tools we’ve taught them, and they’re actually, really, living on their own. There is nothing more satisfying than seeing your little ones become functioning, productive members of society. But there is another side to all of this. They’re not home with me anymore. And I don’t quite know what to do with myself these days. I have one more at home but she’s rarely here and that leaves, well. . . me. And my husband. It’s weird. It’s like we’re dating again. A few weeks ago, we went kayaking. Just the two of us. There was no logistics involved. No babysitters to hire. No juggling of the calendar to make…

Against the odds, the oak sapling took root in our backyard that was filled with scrub pine trees and overrun with bramble. Despite the strong growth of the underbrush, the oak sapling, with its tiny trunk and even tinier branches, pushed upward, reaching for sunlight from high above. It was a decent height, maybe five feet, but scraggly and skinny. A canopy of other trees and thicket kept the sapling in the shade and depleted its soil of nutrients. Vines of various kinds wrapped around it, using it to gain a height of its own. But it didn’t die. It also didn’t thrive. It reminded me of a vine of poison oak more than an oak tree. Its sickly trunk bent and twisted, always jetting out and then reaching up, clearly trying to find a way to reach life-sustaining sunlight. At the time our backyard had a blind fence enclosing a half-acre of mostly scrub pines and thicket. We’d left it that way for over ten years because our youngest son asked us to. He loved being outdoors as well as the feel of “deep woods.” It seems he spent half of his childhood in that space. As children do,…

Instead of trying to find your perfect match in a dating app, we bring you the “Author-Reader Match” where we introduce you to authors as a reader you may fall in love with. It’s our great pleasure to present Charish Reid! Writes: I write interracial, contemporary romances featuring sexy academics who are trying to keep their lives from imploding with deadlines and grading. In The Write Escape, readers will meet, Antonia, a literary editor turned romance writer, who falls in love with an English professor, Aiden, in Ireland. Sparks fly in the rolling hills of the tiny village of Tully Cross, bringing two adorably bookish people together. About: 30-something romance author/professor seeks a reader who enjoys: Irish holidays, heroines who are ready to finally ready to start living, and devastatingly charming heroes with great forearms! What I’m looking for in my ideal reader match: – Doesn’t mind travel mix-ups if they lead to true love – Enjoys close proximity – Wants heroes to listen to their meddling mothers – Agrees with cake baking that leads to amazing oral sex – Must love nervous heroines who take drastic leaps of faith in order to get what they want. (ex. driving a…