reading

How My Book

First Printing August, 2016

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means – electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise without prior written permission from Robin’s Nest Productions.

EBook Version ISBN-13: 978-1-942704-10-2

Paper Print Version ISBN-13: 978-1-942704-06-5

Scripture quotations are taken from the following versions:

ESV: Scripture taken from The ESV® Bible (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®) copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. ESV® Text Edition: 2011. The ESV® text has been reproduced in cooperation with and by permission of Good News Publishers. Unauthorized reproduction of this publication is prohibited. All rights reserved.

The Holy Bible, New International Reader’s Version^®, NIrV^®. Copyright © 1995, 1996, 1998, 2014 by Biblica, Inc.^® Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.com. The “NIrV” and “New International Reader’s Version” are trademarks registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office by Biblica, Inc.^®

Published by Robin’s Nest Productions, Inc.

P.O. Box 2092, Kahului, HI 96733

Cover images by Shutterstock

Cover and interior design by Rachel Schwartz and Ken Raney

Edited by Julee Schwarzburg

Print Copies are Printed in the United States of America by Bethany Press

Bloomington, Minnesota 55438

Table of Contents

Pay Attention
Ask for the Moon
Bless Others
Put Your Whole Heart into Your Work
Humble Yourself
Do the Hard Work
Living in Suspense
Hurry Up and Wait
More
Catch and Release
It’s the People
Show Up
On Set
A Dream Fulfilled
Moon Glow

Chap 1

Chapter 1

Pay Attention

“Not knowing when the dawn will come, I open every door.”

Emily Dickinson

I would like to tell you a story.

It is the true story of how my books became a Hallmark Christmas movie.

If you are a dreamer, you will recognize the unspoken wishes and the parched silences that accompany a fledgling dream. A dream that takes a long time to come true. You’ll feel the familiar sense of hope that rises when promising news comes at just the right time.

If you’re a serious novelist on the hunt for insider tips on how to break into the biz, I’ll be sprinkling throughout the story lessons I learned along the way. But mostly you’ll find on these pages something none of us gets enough of—encouragement and inspiration.

This little book might even dare you to dream again.

The first little seed of my adventure blew my way on a hot July afternoon. I was at a bookseller trade show and had just finished a book signing. I was schlepping a tote bag full of books when the toe of my shoe caught on the collapsing step of the escalator.

I managed to catch myself from falling, but on my awkward dismount, the bag over my shoulder was flung forward. Books, wallet, phone, pens, and business cards all sprawled across the floor at the hub of the convention center.

I gathered up the pieces quickly because important people were scurrying by on their way to their next appointments. One person stopped long enough to help scoop up the remaining two books and hand them to me.

He was an editor I’d met several years earlier at a writer’s retreat on the Oregon coast. He remembered my name and I remembered his. We greeted each other and I laughed with the sort of half-snorting chuckle that comes out when you’re so embarrassed the only thing you can do is be the first one to make fun of yourself.

He asked what I was writing these days. I handed back to him one of the crumpled teen novels he’d just rescued.

He studied the cover and seemed to be trying to think of who he might pass the book on to and said, “Have you ever thought about writing a Christmas novella?”

I said yes because I truthfully had thought about such a project several times. More than that, I knew it’s always good to “open every door,” as Emily Dickinson said. Especially when talking to a book editor at a trade show.

“Who’s your agent?”

I told him and he nodded. “I’ll give her a call.” Off he went to his next appointment.

There it was. The first seed of a small dream planted in a ninety-second divine encounter.

Over the decades that I’ve been writing, I’ve attended dozens of trade shows, conferences, and writer’s retreats. My favorites have always been the International Christian Retail Show and library conventions. At the Frankfurt Book Fair one year, I connected with an influential international writer. She had a profound influence on what I wrote and the way I wrote for the decade following our simple meeting at an afternoon tea. When I attended the Las Vegas Licensing Expo at the invitation of friend in marketing, I gained an eye-opening understanding of how ancillary products connect with books and movies.

The greatest takeaway from these various trade shows has always been from the conversations. Writers, publishers, editors, and agents need times and places where we can interact with others in the industry. You never know who you’ll bump into or what ideas might come to you as a result of a simple conversation.

My agent and I met for dinner the night of my escalator encounter. She grinned as she said, “So, I heard you want to write a Christmas novella.”

“Word travels fast.”

“It does when an editor is on the lookout for something particular. He seemed pretty interested.”

“What did you tell him?”

“I told him I think you could write a delightful Christmas story.”

My agent is always the epitome of grace and affirmation. She is also very practical, which is a good thing when you’re an artistic, intuitive, squishy-hearted-feely type.

“The challenge,” she said. “Is going to be in fitting a project like this into your current schedule. You wouldn’t be able to start writing it until a year from now, and it wouldn’t be released until two years from now.”

“That’s okay. I’d like to do this.”

I was beginning to have a feeling about this project. I didn’t know if the editor would still remember the conversation a week from now. I didn’t know what the book would be about. I didn’t know how it would fit into my current writing schedule.

What I did know was that there are no coincidences in God’s schedule.

All I could do was wait and see if my agent was able to secure a contract with the publisher. That would be the first step.

“Nothing is trivial; since the human soul, with its awful shadow, makes all things sacred.”

Harriet Beecher Stowe

Chap 2

Chapter 2

Ask for the Moon

“Twenty years from now you will be

more disappointed by the things you didn’t do than by the ones you did.

So throw off the bowlines.

Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails.

Explore. Dream. Discover.”

Attributed to Mark Twain

As soon as I got home from the publishing trade show, I set aside some time to dream about the Christmas novella. My pattern before starting a new book is always to sit down with my journal and Bible. I write out a prayer, dedicating the new book to God and asking for His wisdom and direction as the storyline comes together.

I often ask God for a verse that will become the banner over the story. That day I was on the hunt for a verse that kept rolling around in my head. It was a line from Handel’s Messiah. I found it in Isaiah, chapter 9: “And his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.”

I’d always loved that passage. I read it again in The Message because the contemporary paraphrase often clarified the surrounding passages and made verses like this one come alive. I started by backing up and reading from Isaiah chapter 1. A verse in Isaiah chapter 7 caught my attention. I read it twice and underlined it. The modern words stirred the poetic dreamer in me.

I copied Isaiah 7:10–11 in my journal: “God spoke again to Ahaz. This time he said, ‘Ask for a sign from your God. Ask anything. Be extravagant. Ask for the moon!’”

I smiled as I wrote the last part. Ask for the moon.

I’d spent many nights gazing at the moon and dreaming. Sitting by a window and being drenched in moon glow is my happy place. I’d written at least a half-a-dozen poems about the moon over the years. Some people feel inspired by sunsets or snow-covered mountaintops. Those natural wonders make them feel closer to God. For me, it’s always been the moon. Ever since I was a child, I’d imagined that a full moon was the way God reminded us that He was with us, smiling down on us.

A slightly over-the-moon type thought came to me.

What if I could go to England to do research for this Christmas novella?

That would certainly be extravagant. Did I dare ask for such a thing? The words in the verse seemed so bold. Ask anything. Be extravagant. Ask for the moon.

I read on in Isaiah 7 and in the next verse it’s clear that Ahaz was too timid to ask God for anything. He let the invitation slip by and he asked for nothing. In The Living Bible the account is recorded with these words in verse 12: “But the king refused. ‘No,’ he said, ‘I’ll not bother the Lord with anything like that.’”

Doesn’t that sound like something most of us would say?

I’d felt that way so many times in my life. I knew God loved me. I knew He had plans for me and was accomplishing His purposes for me. But most of the time I didn’t want to bother Him with the whims and wishes of my unreliable heart. I never wanted to presume upon His goodness.

As I read Isaiah’s response to Ahaz, my eye caught on the familiar Christmas verse tucked into this story in Isaiah 7:13–14. “Isaiah said: ‘O House of David, you aren’t satisfied to exhaust my patience; you exhaust the Lord’s as well! All right then, the Lord himself will choose the sign—a child shall be born to a virgin! And she shall call him Immanuel (meaning, “God is with us”).’”

My heart fluttered at the thought of such extravagance from God. Immanuel! God is with us! He invites us to ask of Him—to “ask for the moon.” Yet like Ahaz, we ask for nothing and think ourselves pious because we’re not troubling God with our whims and wishes and requests. But God, great God, who is accomplishing His purposes in us and through us and often in spite of us, chooses to still give and give and give. Extravagantly. Over the moon.

“Immanuel. God is with us.”