What an Honor!

I'm still excited and honored and blessed to know my book, The Outsider, is one of five finalists announced last week by the Evangelical Christian Publishers Association for the 2009 Christian Book Award in Fiction. Since 1978 the Christian Book Awarde has honored titles in six categories: Bibles, Bible Reference and Study, Christian Life, Fiction, Children & Youth, and Inspirational & Gift. I'm overwhelmed that my book was picked for a fiction finalist. I'm going to Dallas, Texas in March to be there when they announce the winners at the Awards Banquet that is a ticketed event open to the public for the first time ever. I feel as if I'm a winner already just by being in the five finalists along with Riven by Jerry B. Jenkins, Home Another Way by Christa Parrish, Less than Dead by Tim Downs, The Shape of Mercy by Susan Meissner. What great company to be among!

And I know you're excited for me too. I'm going to meet so many well-known Christian authors I know I'll be big-eyed with wonder. Hope I'll know how to act. Of course with me I just have to be myself. That's how the Lord made me and while He probably shakes His head sometimes about the mistakes I make, He always tells me to get up off my duff and give it another try. That's all any off us can do after we flub up. Try again and hope we learned from our mistakes. Not that I expect to flub up in Dallas. I've discovered that most writers are friendly and fun to talk to - famous or not.

Talk about flubbing up. I've made about a zillion typing errors doing this blog entry. You'd laugh if you could see me. I'm in WV babysitting my sweet grandbaby boys and using my granddaughter's laptop to get on line. A keyboard gremlin has to have been hold of her keyboard (or maybe her little sisters) but nine of the key covers are missing and it's a challenge to type without them. Plus I'm trying to keep the babies happy. Two are twice as sweet and twice as much love, but two are also twice as much crying. I thought I'd be able to do some research reading while I was here, but forget that. One of them wants Grandma to hold them all the time. They're five and a half months old and really very good, but all babies cry and need holding. Two twice as much. Speaking of which, Matt says he's hungry. Now, Grandma!

Talk to you Wednesday.

Ice Is Not Nice & Surprising News

Ice is not nice. Except in a tall glass of tea or in the summer mixed with rock salt to make some creamy homemade banana ice cream. But in the middle of the winter on the trees is not nice. It's been nasty here in Kentucky. Over 500,000 people without electricity including me for a while and my 88 year-old mom still. She's not happy. She likes being in her own place and own bed, but it's cold with no heat. She's lived through some chilly times. When she first got married, the old house they lived in only had a fireplace grate for heat and she said that sometimes in the winter when they'd come downstairs in the morning the water would be frozen in the teapot next to the fireplace. Now that's cold. But she's used to that nice thermostat controlled heat now that you need electricity for. Her whole neighborhood is out and I don't know why. No trees are down on lines or anything. Now out here in the country, there are trees down everywhere.

But you know, I went for a walk in the ice and snow and it is pretty. I took a ton of pictures and if I had a faster connection I'd put some up here on the blog, but pictures don't travel over my slow dial-up connection very fast. Most of the time it times out and sticks its tongue out at me. So just imagine everything coated with ice and icicles hanging down from every branch and fence. Of course right now I'd like to imagine it melting and Mom's heat coming back on. Soon.

Great news to share with all of you about my book The Outsider. It's been chosen as one of five finalists for the Evangelical Christian Publishers Association (ECPA) for fiction book of the year. Wow! I'm surprised and happy. The winners will be announced in March. I'll share more news when I get it.

I'm going to be in WV babysitting the twin boys this weekend while the rest of the family goes to Disney World. I hope to be able to do my blog on Sunday as usual if the boys cooperate. They're five months old. Maybe they'll sleep at the same time some of the time. It should be fun.

You all breath some hot air over this way toward Kentucky and maybe all this ice will melt. Can you believe the Ohio Book Club I talked to Monday night (and they were fun and asked neat questions) said I sounded southern? I think that was their nice way of saying I sounded country. I am country. Talk to you soon.