Smiles, Books, and Friends

Lori Copeland, me, and Virginia Smith

"Let us always meet each other with a smile, for the smile is the beginning of love." ~ Mother Teresa

There was a lot of smiling going on yesterday at the Southern Kentucky Book Fest in Bowling Green, Kentucky as authors and readers gathered to celebrate books. That's really what book fairs and festivals are all about - books.

I've had a love affair with books ever since I was a kid, and from the people I've talked to at book fairs, I know I have lots of company in this loving books fan club. That's why book fairs are so much fun, because you're in a big room with dozens, even hundreds of people who like books as much as you do. They have experienced the magic of words making stories that spring to life in the mind of a reader. And some of them, those behind the tables of books, know how it feels to be the one trying to make the magic of words and storytelling happen. They understand how much we all want readers to pick up our books and give our stories a chance.

But there are so many authors and so many choices that most readers only get to carry home a few of the books they want. Believe me, I know. I'm one of those readers. At this book fest I didn't really have time to look around so I was spared the temptation of all those wonderful books begging to go home with me.

I've been to a lot of book fairs. I attended my first one sometime in the 1980s. That was with my young adult books. Now I've been going with my Christian fiction novels for the last seven years. One thing I have found to be true in writing for the Christian book market is that the other authors are so welcoming and so ready to be friends. I don't know if I was too backward as a young author to make friends among the other writers or perhaps too busy with my young family, but until I started writing in the Christian market I couldn't really claim any other writer as a friend. I had some acquaintances but no real, let's get together for lunch and talk friends.

Now I'm blessed with many friends in the writing business. Friends ready to support me with encouraging words and helpful advice. Friends who will pray for me and friends I am ready to pray for when they have a need. Friends who seem genuinely happy when something good happens in regard to one of my books. Friends who are excited to share their good news with me. Friends who take pictures with me and their smiles light up a room. We share troubles. We share joys. We share disappointments. We share victories. We share those things with our readers too. Sometimes disguised in our stories. Sometimes in real life. It's good to have book loving friends. 

Thanks for reading and thanks for being one of those book loving friends.

Writers Groups and Book Fairs

I had a great weekend of writing events. Friday I got to meet with a writers' group and talk writing and books. Is there anything more fun than talking books? Oh yeah, reading them. This group had lots of great questions. Some about the Shakers. More about writing and the process of publishing. These writers knew some about publishing because they gave me a book they'd published with a poem, story, or other piece written by each of the group members. What a thrill to see your words in print!

I don't have any problem remembering seeing my first pieces in print in this or that magazine. And I actually had a poem printed. My second sale ever. As I told the group Friday, I got a whole three dollars for it. But seeing the words "by Ann Gabhart" was (as they say on that t.v. commercial) priceless. I didn't use the H. in my name then. I started doing that when I published The Scent of Lilacs. I was trying to make a new beginning with that book since I'd had several very discouraging writing years prior to that.

I was an interested observer as the writers' group picked a topic for a poem for their next meeting. They had written down suggestions for maybe ten or twelve topics. Then they voted and chose "A turn in the road." I wondered if I'd be able to write a poem about a turn in my road. Probably not. I was never much of a poet in spite of that three dollars I earned with four little rhyming lines once. But I might have thought about a story with a turn in the road. In fact every story has some turns in the roads of the characters. Without a few turns and bends, problems and challenges, you don't have much of a story. So I was impressed with their enthusiasm for writing and their willingness to use their creative energy on a suggested topic. I was never crazy about suggested topics for writing even in high school English. I always wanted to come up with my own idea. Guess that's why I've never been a member of a writers' group.

I did my character exercise with them. They weren't really into it the way most of the groups I've had do it. Maybe they were like me with my suggested topic reluctance. They all wanted to come up with their own names, their own person and not have a community person. One of the writers said he already had his story half written about our woman character named Reeny. I think that was her name. I liked Reena better, but it was their character. The point of the exercise is that we can invent a community character like Reeny but then each of us would write a totally different story from that jumping off spot. Someday when I have a longer workshop, maybe we'll write those stories. Gee, maybe I do like suggested topics after all if I'm doing the suggesting. ;-)

But our writing time ended and I had to hurry home to get ready for the Kentucky Book Fair on Saturday. I love book fairs when lots of readers are wandering around looking at everybody's books. And thank you to those of you who carried off my books. I heard from one of those readers who has already read my book, The Believer. In one day. I think she's my new best friend. Back when I wrote young adult fiction and was at this same book fair, a young girl bought one of my books in the morning and came back before I left that afternoon to say she'd already read it. Thank goodness she liked the story and didn't want a refund.

Thanks for reading. I hope you find lots of good books that keep you smiling. I smiled so much yesterday that I felt like a Miss America contestant. But a good book can always make me smile and there were good books all around me.

P.S. See, you guys at the writers' group were right. I did blog about you.