Love Inspired Author Anna Schmidt & Her Love of History

Today a fellow Wisconsin author, Anna Schmidt, tells about her mother's heritage.

"My love of history came down to me from my parents -- especially my Mom. I truly think she would have been happy to have lived in an earlier time! At any rate although she had less than a high school education, she was an avid reader and loved (as I do) puttering around in antique shops and looking at items with an eye to who might have held them and used them before. She taught me that if we pay attention to what has gone before we can avoid repeating the same mistakes.

Clearly we are two generations of cock-eyed optimists!

But writing GIFT FROM THE SEA (my latest novel for Steeple Hill and the sequel to SEASIDE CINDERELLA) was a pure labor of love. The idea was to bring two people together who would have been natural enemies in the years of WWI -- an American nurse and a German seaman caught my heart.

Believe me, my hero and heroine totally took over once I brought them onstage and the exploration of the question of forgiveness became the focus for the story and their ability to find love.

Disagreements between nations are really (IMHO) disagreements between governments. When we are brought face to face with another individual whose ideals, traditions and even faith differs from our own, each of us must decide -- do I respect and value this person even thought his or her values and beliefs may differ from my own? And if I do then how to begin a dialogue that will lead to understanding and acceptance and true peace on earth. Blessings to you all."--Anna Schmidt
PS: Hope you will watch my website www.booksbyanna.com "Stories of Challenges Met with Courage, Faith and Healing" for some exciting new opportunities to win free stuff coming later this summer!!!

Thanks, Anna, my own mother always stopped at any little town museum we passed through and I did the same for my children who also became lovers of history.
Anna has already sent me signed copies of both her books--SEASIDE CINDERELLA and its sequel GIFT FROM THE SEA--which will be included in my MEGA May gift basket drawing.--Lyn

Book Monday--Bestselling Author Robin Lee Hatcher

Today, it's my pleasure to tout my friend inspirational romance author Robin Lee Hatcher's newest title.

Who says a woman can’t do a man’s job?

Put up or shut up! Complaining about Bethlehem Springs' dissolute mayoral candidate, Gwen Arlington is challenged to take on the role herself. For seven years, she’s carved out an independent life in the bustling mountain town of Bethlehem Springs, Idaho, teaching piano and writing for the local newspaper. But now she’s a single woman running for mayor — and in 1915 this decision is bound to stir up trouble.

Morgan McKinley is fed up with the delays that hinder the construction of New Hope Health Spa, a place where both rich and poor can come for rest and healing. New to the area, he has determined that serving as mayor would help him push through his agenda for progress.

Gwen and Morgan each want to prove they are the most qualified candidate, not only to voters but to each other, and so sparks fly as the two campaign. Although Morgan has learned to guard his heart as fiercely as Gwen guards her independence, could they learn to be allies instead of adversaries?

This first book in the Sisters of Bethlehem Springs Series provides intriguing insights into how women challenged convention and shaped America in the early twentieth century. To buy a copy: http://www.robinleehatcher.com/bookbuyoptions.html

A reader's opinion:

"Robin Lee Hatcher is such a diverse writer. She encompasses so many different genres and her books are just a pleasure to read. One of my all time favorites books is Robin's book "Ribbon of Years" for the originality she uses in her writing style. A good example of women's fiction is her recent book "A Perfect Life", but "A Vote of Confidence" looked different than anything I had previously read by Robin so I was excited to see what it would bring to the table. Here again Robin shows her diversity in styles as she presents a book that takes us back in time and introduces us to a single woman in a time when women have the right to vote, but that is about it ... A fun read in the same vein as Deeanne Gist or Cathy Marie Hake... I really enjoyed this book - a new winner from Robin Lee Hatcher!" — via Amazon review 5/1/09

Best-selling novelist Robin Lee Hatcher is known for her heartwarming and emotionally charged stories of faith, courage, and love. To learn more, visit http://www.robinleehatcher.com and watch the book video there too.
She makes her home in Idaho where she enjoys spending time with her family and her high-maintenance Papillon, Poppet.

Brenda Minton & her mom Rosetta

Today, another Love Inspired author shares the story of her mother. Here's Brenda:

"When I think of strong women, I think of a woman that I didn’t have in my life for long enough. My mom, Rosetta Kasiah, lost her struggle with breast cancer 27 years ago. I was fourteen. As a child I wanted her to fight harder, to not give up. Looking back at her life, I realize now that she fought harder than anyone. My mother not only fought cancer, but she was also a polio survivor. She grew up in the 1930s and 40s, in a family with nearly a dozen children. Life was not easy, not by any stretch of the imagination. But my mother survived. She overcame her disability.

As a matter of fact, growing up, I never realized she had one. She didn’t talk about it. She didn’t let it stop her. She was beautiful, caring, and always busy. She worked our farm, she worked in the school cafeteria and she made a career out of selling AVON. Avon was the place where she shined. She went door-to-door, taking me with her. She knew everyone, and everyone loved her. In the fourteen years that I had her in my life she taught me lessons that I didn’t realize she was teaching me. She taught me to fight for what I wanted, even if it was just an orphaned baby bird or a possum. Yes, a possum.

My room was a menagerie of orphaned animals and bird’s eggs. She was willing to go sledding with me, and to sit outside and watch my latest fantastic bike trick. She taught me to dream. My mother also encouraged my love of books. Each month that we got the form from Scholastic, I would pick out several books. Old Bones the Wonder Horse, Black Beauty, King of the Wind and many more. I still have several of them. One of the sweetest memories is of the two of us on the couch reading ALL CREATURES GREAT AND SMALL out of Reader’s Digest. We loved those stories and we loved watching PBS together. The other thing my mom did for me: she sent me to church. She always felt self-conscious in dresses, so she wouldn’t go. But each Sunday she would wake me up and send me.



I didn’t know until later that her faith included time alone with God, and the blessing of ministries on our local TV stations. My mom was the one of the strongest women that I know, and I wish I could have known her better. Lacey Gould is the heroine in THE COWBOY NEXT DOOR, my May Love Inspired. Like my mother, Lacey had a difficult childhood, but she wanted better and she was willing to work hard to change her life."

Thanks, Brenda--Lyn

Sandra Robbins Honors Her Mother

Today Sandra Robbins shares a story about her mother. Here's Sandra:

"A few years ago my grandson asked me a question that made me smile. With the true innocence of a child, he looked at me and said, “Were our ancestors the ones who lived on the plantations in the old South?”

I struggled to keep from smiling as I replied, “No, you’re not descended from material wealth, you have something even better. Your ancestors who scratched out a living in the rich soil of the South left you a heritage of love of God, love for family, and a work ethic that makes you productive.”

These traits have always been most evident in my mother. Raised as the daughter of sharecroppers during the Depression, she dropped out of high school to marry my father. She never had a diploma, but she was the most well-read person I ever knew and could discuss any topic.

In her early twenties, however, she experienced something that threatened to end her marriage. She was a young wife and hadn’t traveled much from her familiar surroundings of the rural South. When my father was struck with mastoiditis and an abscess on the brain, she found herself alone and plunged into the world of a big city hospital among strangers. She was scared and knew the life she’d envisioned with her husband might end. As my father hovered between life and death, this young girl turned for strength to God.

When despair threatened to overtake her, someone would pop into her life, and she knew they’d been sent by God. One person she often spoke of was a woman who appeared one morning and insisted they go downstairs to have breakfast together. She’d hardly left the room since she’d arrived, and the invitation came at a time when she needed a break. Another time she heard a slight cough in the hall and threw the door open to find her brother standing there. He’d driven the long distance in a farm Jeep to bring their parents to spend some time with her.

As her husband improved, she heard the doctors tell him he lucky was to be alive. When he was dismissed from the hospital with his head swathed in bandages, this young girl made all the arrangements for their return home by train and delivered him safely.

With my father’s life spared, they went on to have four children and were married for sixty-two years. My mother never worked outside the home, but she had a ministry. After her experience in the city, she learned to drive, and her car became known by everybody in her town. She was always the first to arrive with her car’s trunk loaded with food when death or illness struck a family. She went on to serve as first lady in her town and her county as my father attained various elected offices. But she never forgot the days when she sat by her husband’s bedside and trusted their future to the Lord they served."


Thanks for sharing, Sandra--Lyn

Audrey Hebbert tells the story of Gwen Edland

Today, Audrey Hebbert, a new friend, shares a story about a woman we can all admire. Here's Audrey:

"Gwen Edland is a strong woman. Rather than relaxing in retirement, the 74-year-old Nebraska great-grandmother has become a globetrotting evangelist, sharing the gospel even in the world's more dangerous places.

Sometimes teaming up with organizations like the Omaha Rapid Response Team to offer food and supplies, other times organizing her own team, Edland has prayed with thousands to receive Christ in more than 67 nations, including Iraq, China and Russia. A registered nurse, certified teacher and licensed pastor, Edland has given away countless Jesus and Passion of the Christ videos, and the evangelistic pamphlet, Step Up To Life, which has been translated into more than 28 languages.
(Gwen, Ken & Waheed)

“Being with Gwen is like being with a modern day Moses because it seems like the sea just parts and we walk right through,” said David Collins, Life Care Pastor at Trinity Church Interdenominational in Omaha, Nebraska. He has accompanied Edland on trips to China. “It's an astonishing experience. She's so dedicated and so focused in her devotion to the Lord.”

Everyone loves Gwen Edland, including children, young people and adults, all the way up to one of her best friends and primary intercessors who is 92 years old. Edland always greets everyone as if they were her best friend. She sincerely inquires about people; she dances with the children in the street; and always has a joke or upbeat comment to make. Yet this is a strong woman who gets the job done for her Lord.

“I always assume I have a green light until God gives me a red light,” she says. A red light does not signal stop, but rather, figure out how to change tactics and get the job done anyway. On May 8th Edland will leave Pastor Rafael's house in Uganda around 7:00 a.m. with an eight-person team, headed for a temporary clinic. They will diagnose illness and dispense medicines, and share the love of Jesus with an amazing number of people who have lined up along a dirt path until evening, when they move to the area where they conduct evangelistic crusades until after 10:00 p.m. Then it's home for dinner and rest until the next morning. Somehow this team will find time to deliver sewing machines to people who need to earn money where there are no jobs.

The team will conduct a women's conference, minister to 50 Ugandan pastors, speak to 97 million muslims on the radio each weekend, and conduct a mass wedding for couples who have become believers and are convicted that they need to be officially married. Gwen has been collecting wedding dresses and rings for the “big wedding.” Since I've known Edland, she's had signs and wonders on her short term missions trips. Her first was in 1993 when she went to Sweden. Without knowing the language, she understood everyone she talked with, and they understood her. Since then she's escaped flying bullets, safely walked the most dangerous slums in Venezuela, handing everyone a Step Up to Life, and watching them stop to read it. She's prayed for people with amazing results, and saw a woman come back from the dead.

Read more at http://audrey4j.blogspot.com/2009/02/raised-from-dead.html.

I wrote Green Light Red Light, a novel describing her work in China, where she slips past the Communist officials, shares the gospel with them and everyone in her university-sponsored English classes, and has fun along the way. She plans to be in China this year, July 11-August 15, her 17th trip since 1993.


You'll find the book at http://www.amazon.com/Green-Light-Red-Audrey-Hebbert/dp/0976522233/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1241109229&sr=1-1, and more information at www.audreyhebbert.com "

Thanks, Audrey!

Janet Dean & Rahab

Today my friend Janet Dean tells the story of her heroine:
Here's Janet:
"Adelaide Crum, the heroine of my debut novel, Courting Miss Adelaide, possessed strength and courage to do what was right, no matter the cost. Her father left her mother when Adelaide was a baby. Her unhappy mother was unaffectionate and critical of her daughter, but Adelaide found solace in God’s love and in her church family. When Adelaide learns a group of orphans are coming to town, she sees this as her chance to mother a child. But rules prevented single women from having custody. The selection committee turns down her request for a child.

Adelaide suspects Ed Drummond of abusing Emma and William, two of the orphans in his care. Since Ed is a respected member of the community, her concerns aren’t taken seriously. When circumstances bring Emma into Adelaide’s home, the little girl’s behavior heightens Adelaide’s disquiet about what’s going on in the Drummond household. She investigates, incurring Ed’s wrath, but she won’t back down even though her actions risk her business and even her life. Through all her difficulties, Adelaide leans on God and never falters. In the end, she saves the children, gains true love and a family.
Numerous strong women come alive in the pages of the Bible, but I’m particularly drawn to Rahab, the prostitute in Joshua 2:1. Rahab faced great peril in order to save the Israelite spies sent by Joshua to search out the Promised Land. Rahab had heard how the Israelites’ God freed them from slavery in Egypt. She’d heard how their God parted the Red Sea and given them the towns across the Jordan. Rahab acknowledged God, saying to the spies: for the Lord your God, he is God in heaven above and in earth beneath.
When the king of Jericho sent word to Rahab to turn over the men staying in her house, she hid them on the roof among stalks of flax, and then told the king the men had left the city. After obtaining the spies’ promise to save her household when they returned to capture Jericho, she let them down by a cord through the window of her house built on the town wall. In the end, Rahab’s courage not only saved these men and her family, but her son Boaz is named in the lineage of Jesus. God uses those even with imperfect beginnings for His purpose.


My second book, Courting the Doctor’s Daughter releases May 12. Mary Graves faces supreme challenges as she battles for her adopted son. I hope you’ll look for Mary’s story on bookstore and discount store shelves. Thanks for having me today, Lyn! No matter the era or the circumstances, to raise children takes courage and strength. God bless loving mothers everywhere. Happy Mother’s Day! --Janet "
Same to you, Janet--Lyn

Book Monday-Susan May Warren's Nothing but Trouble

Today Susan May Warren tells us about her latest in PJ Sugar - Trouble Collection, another Romantic Comedy/Suspense. Here's Susan:

"It's not fair to say that trouble happens every time PJ Sugar is around, but it feels that way when she returns to her hometown, looking for a fresh start. Within a week, her former teacher is murdered and her best friend's husband is arrested as the number-one suspect. Although the police detective investigating the murder--who also happens to be PJ's former flame--is convinced it's an open-and-shut case, PJ's not so sure. She begins digging for clues in an effort to clear her friend's husband and ends up reigniting old passions, uncovering an international conspiracy, and solving a murder along the way. She also discovers that maybe God can use a woman who never seems to get it right.

PJ Sugar knows three things for sure:

After traveling the country for ten years hoping to shake free from the trail of disaster that’s become her life, she needs a fresh start.

The last person she wants to see when she heads home for her sister’s wedding is Boone—her former flame and the reason she left town.

Her best friend’s husband absolutely did not commit the first murder Kellogg, Minnesota, has seen in more than a decade.

What PJ doesn’t know is that when she starts digging for evidence, she’ll uncover much more than she bargained for—a deadly conspiracy, a knack for investigation, and maybe, just maybe, that fresh start she’s been longing for.


Behind the Pages
Sometimes, do you feel like you just don’t fit in? You look around you and if anyone knew how difficult it was just to put yourself together, to smile when you feel completely overwhelmed, to even figure out what you were making for supper, they’d know what a mess you were. Maybe you totally relate to those words in 1 Peter – God’s elect, strangers and aliens in the world. Do you feel like when you look in the rear view mirror, all you see are your mistakes? Maybe not. But if so, then PJ is your gal. I wanted to write a story about the person in so many of us who just wants to get it right…but can’t seem to stay out of trouble. My friend and I have what we call the “stupid mouth” club…and we report our weekly foibles
(usually on Monday, after Sunday church!).

PJ is our charter member. She’s the girl that changes her mind, always hopes for the best, is always discovering that she is just a little different than everyone else. PJ is us. And that’s good news. Because God loves PJ. He loves her messiness, and her impulsiveness, her heart bent toward others, the hope that fuels her actions. And He has a plan for PJ – one that includes her weaknesses as well as her strengths. Yep, I need to hear that – need to hear that I don’t have to be perfect for God to love me, use me, sing over me. Need to hear that although I don’t fit in, well, I’m not supposed to…in fact, I’m supposed to be a little…alien. So, to all the PJs out there – and anyone who knows a PJ -- this book is for you.

Thank you for reading PJ’s adventures – I hope you come back for her continuing craziness with Boone, and Jeremy and her PI dreams, in the next book: Double Trouble. And meanwhile, may you live with joy on the outside the unique and delightful person God has created on the inside. In His Grace," Susan May Warren