Into the Fire

Imagination is a wonderful thing. It spawns creativity. No one can compete with God's imagination – which is probably a foolish thing to say because His "imagination" creates reality. Mankind is blessed with gifts and talents from our Creator who has given us the abilities to create realities from that imagination. Some use it to engineer incredible machinery or mathematical formulas or escapades into outer space. Others of us use it to write stories based on images, topics, people we've known or met or want to meet – even if they're not real. 

Authors of novels must make fictional realities that reveal something relatable to those who read them. No matter what genre – be it fantasy to sci-fi, love story to women's fiction, thrillers to mysteries – no matter what, there has to be some identiable "thing" or emotion within the story to grab a reader's attention and allow them to insert him or herself into that pseudo reality. By so doing, that "story" becomes life-like to the reader. 

One of my favorite compliments is that my characters are relatable. That means I've accomplished one of the goals in presenting the story. So. I thank every reader of one or many of my novels who has "related" to one or more of my characters, and know this because I can't say it often enough: Apart from the Lord, I can do nothing. 

Father, you give me inspiration, stories, determination to present you in the midst of all the goings-on in this sin-stained world. May I never fail to do so. Thank you is never enough. In the Name of Jesus, Amen.