“What other books is she in?”
Do all authors get that question? I wonder. You see, it’s one I hear almost every time a reader and I chat about a character he or she likes. We’ll talk about flaws and annoyances—fun fact: most of the time I’m annoyed abot the same things my readers are—and eventually that question comes around.
I guess it’s a fair one. After all, some of my characters seem to show up in almost every book at some point—Alexa Hartfield, Willow, and even Keith from The Agency Files.
Bentley is no exception. There I was, blissfully writing along on Noble Pursuits way back at the beginning of my writing days when Bentley popped up in my head and said, “Write my story.”
That happened a lot back then—still does, actually—but I hadn’t learned to write down a bunch of notes and just get back to the current WIP (work in progress) as I do now. I would write whatever showed up. I still have tons of books that have between one and ten chapters started (or finished and are so bad that they need total rewrites) to work on. Shiny new plots, though. They beckon! All because yet another character demands another book.
This girl had the notion that as Christians, we’ve got this marriage thing backward. We go into it to serve ourselves (find our happiness, fall in love, all the me-ness) and then God will be glorified. She wondered if maybe it wasn’t the other way around—that if we went into marriage with the idea of doing it to glorify God, the result would be… our happiness.
Look, she’s got a point.
I wrote half of what would become Blessing Bentley before I went back to Noble Pursuits (it’s getting a rewrite, so it’s off Amazon right now). But around the part where Fran at the Post Office offered her free chicks before they died, so did my story idea–died that is. I realized that I didn’t know what exactly was supposed to happen. So I put it away.
For ten years.
Oh, and those chicks never made it into the final version… or did they? I can’t even remember now!
In the meantime, I wrote about seventy more books. No, really. I did. More like seventy-five, if you want the truth. I’m just shy of eighty books now. EEEP!
But something odd kept happening in those books.
Bentley appeared.
First, in the first rendition of what will become Tempting Tait. Originally it was called “Haven.” #becauseoriginal. See, Haven was always about Tait, and Tait was always into Bentley—until things got complicated, anyway.
Then she popped up in conversation in Thirty Days Hath…. Tom Allen asks Adric and Allison if maybe they need to consider that if they have so much in common and are compatible, they should focus on making things work and trusting God for warm fuzzies later.
Past Forward was next… I think. The order blurs, you know? Anyway, Lily Allen also brought up Bentley, but she decided that wasn’t her story to tell. Later, Bentley’s newly-landscaped yard is referenced and Bentley is caroling with everyone.
Of course, there was that time in The Vintage Wren when Bentley gives Cassie a plastic bottle of water. Hee hee! That I did on purpose, because Bentley is known for her water obsession. I just didn’t realize how many little hints about her that I put in books until I’d started looking for them! I mostly remembered one. One that actually helped me figure out how to finish the book in the first place.
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Bentley’s cameo in Tarnished Silver.
Kelly Cox is in deep trouble in that book. She runs into Bentley and a conversation about how our vows aren’t just “I vow not to cheat on you” but are a bit more complicated than that really kicked that story in gear. Actually, it kicked two stories into gear. Because you see, that’s when I realized what was missing from Bentley’s story—those vows.
In Tarnished Silver, Bentley doesn’t have a large role, but she sure has an important one. Her job is to get several of the women thinking about what their vows actually mean. What did we promise when we got married? The standard set of vows has a few notable promises.
- Love
- Honor
- Cherish
- Better or worse
- Sickness and health
- Richer or poorer
- Until death.
That list holds a lot of promises, but do we really do them?
Love? Put someone else ahead of ourselves? Serve? Prefer them? To I Corinthians 13 them? To Philippians 4:8 them? Think of all those verses in the Bible that tell us how to love one another. Do we keep those vows to love our spouses… all the time? Ahem.
Hate to admit it, but I can’t say I do. My husband does a much better job of that than I do.
Honor? How many Facebook posts are there about stupid husbands who do stupid things? Vague-booked posts about how some people don’t appreciate all we do… About how someone forgot to… [fill in the blank].
Cherish? When you cherish something, you take the very best care of it you can. You won’t let anything injure it if within your power. Do you really cherish your spouse?
Look, I’m preachin’ to the choirmaster here.
I’m a pathetic excuse for a vow keeper. Just puttin’ that out there. It hurts to admit it now, and it hurt to admit it back when I first started working on Bentley. Every word that I wrote in that book cost me something. Every lesson in there is a sermon… to me.
And it all started when a character showed up and got a wild hair about marriage. Then she did something that too often, we don’t do. She considered it. Examined it.
She coddled it, even. Then she did the unexpected.
What Happens When a Character Demands a Book?
You write it.
But you take your time. Instead of rushing through it, you let those ideas percolate. You live out the ideas and examine them in light of Scripture. Just because a character demands a book doesn’t mean it has to be today. It could take a while.
Then it happens. Maybe it’s a conversation with a friend, or perhaps it’s something you overhear. You go to a wedding, or you watch a movie. In the middle of all this living, you take that plunge. You write that book.
And if you’re me… that book becomes a three-book series when you weren’t looking.
Because when a character demands her own book, you write it. And when you write it, you learn valuable lessons that sometimes just don’t fit in a single book. Why should they? We don’t all learn all the lessons in one life. We each learn the ones we need to learn in our own lives. It’s just how it is.
Today is my anniversary.
I’ve been married for thirty-one years, and I’ve learned a thing or two. I just have a dozen or twenty I still need to learn. Every day.
In honor of my anniversary, I have two cool promotions going on “right now.”
First, Tarnished Silver is free starting Friday and will be free from November 29-December 3, 2019. I’m telling you this because it’s a book close to my heart. I wrote it the year of our 25th anniversary. In it, I put our cattle drive-like wedding in the little Chapel of the Bells in Las Vegas. I put all the things that went wrong, including the fact that I wore my jeans and a jean jacket. No ring. All the nothings.
Hint: Audrey was another case where a character demands a book. Just sayin’. I just remembered that!
Second, Blessing Bentley is on sale ($2 off!) through Friday. This is crazy unusual. The book isn’t even six months old yet. But because of the strong emphasis on marriage in that book, I decided to drop the price by a couple of dollars for the week. It’s not a great deal, but it’s the only one I’ll be doing before June when book two, Tempting Tait comes out. It has a lot of fans, which blesses my socks off.
Meanwhile… I think I need to go read it again myself. Dig back into the Word.
Thank the Lord for those times when a character demands a book.
See, I was gone for nine weeks of this year. Nine weeks. That’s 17% of the year. Ouch. I want my husband to know how much I appreciate all he did while I was gone and that not once, not even once, did he hint that I was doing him a disservice.
Happy reading.
Psst… leave a comment below and I’ll draw a name to send someone a paperback. 😀
I loved reading about Bentley, and I also really loved reading how her story came about.
As your characters always do, Bentley really made me think. I love finding out about how the story became a story. Thanks for always challenging me!
I can’t wait to read Tempting Tait and a brush up on Bentley will definitely be necessary!
I love how you bring characters from other books in your stories…
I love how characters demand their own stories in the middle of another story.
Bentley is so unique, and the cover is beautiful!
Bentley sounds like quite a lady! And maybe with some lessons I need to lesrn.
Glad your mom is well enough to help you with the dishes.
Thank you for your willingness to continue writing clean romance!! Also, thanks for the chance at a paperback! I’m so thankful you’re mom is doing better!!!
God bless
First of all “Happy Belated Anniversary to you and your husband!” When my mom was started needing us to help her , my siblings and I took turns going to her house to help her, a lot of times I would be gone for over a month, since I was one of the siblings that didn’t work, and believe me I would do it all over again without any hesitation! I have 5 siblings , 3 brothers and 2 sisters and so we all took turns and did what we could. Our mom passed away this past March, she was 87 and she suffered a lot with her sickness. My husband was very supportive and when it was my turn to help my mom , he would drive me 5 hours and then he would turn right back and come home, I am so very Blessed to have such a very considerate husband and so very helpful. It sounds like you too are Very Blessed with such a good husband. Your books sound like very good books. Thank you for the chance. Have a Great weekend. God Bless you and your Family.
I love how your characters have always been intertwined in your books! I’ve been an avid reader of your work for many years, but haven’t read hardly any books for the past few years as life got in the way. Looks like I have a lot of catching up to do! Happy Anniversary!
Happy Anniversary! This sounds like a book I would really enjoy reading!
I am always blessed by your books and blogs! Thankful for you!
Happy Anniversary! Bentley sounds like someone I would love to get to know!
Happy Anniversary. Love your books.
I like it when there are threads within an author’s books that don’t necessarily have to be read in order, but it gives a little extra meaning to those who have read all of them. 🙂 It’s so sweet.
Your books always leave someone with hope and something to look forward to
Marriage is such a huge promise, honor and commitment isn’t it? I’ve been married 34 years and I’m still “getting” it. Happy Anniversary!
Love this! How great that your daughter married on your anniversary!! Glad your Mom is doing well enough to keep the dishes washed up for you, too!!!
Love reading your post! They are not only informative on your books, but also give some of the story behind them as well as you the writer. Makes me want to read them all the more.
Happy Anniversary and may God bless you with many more years of happiness! It’s the hard times that makes us strong but it’s love that keeps us going. We are truly blessed when we find someone that is just as happy to spend their lives with us (through the good and the bad) as we are to spend it with them.
Please keep on writing and posting – both of which we enjoy reading!
Happy Anniversary!!??
I loved reading this blog post.
Happy Anniversary
I really want to read Bentley’s story
What an amazing story! I love how God uses your own characters to urge you to write a story! Very cool! I’m very much looking forward to reading this book!
Happy anniversary. Hope you have many more happy years together celebrating each other and your huge wonderful family.
Wow! Bentley sounds like such a neat character! I love her perspective on marriage. How wonderful it would be if we could remember that all the time!
How very thankful to God I am for you and your precious family. During the past 19 years, I’ve learned so much from you. Your books have cherished places in our home and in our hearts. (I just asked Anna to decorate my 12 Chemo Side Effect Worksheets. She said, “Like Willow. Got it!”
<3 Happy Anniversary and Happy Thanksgiving! <3 I find the combination today to be very appropriate for y'all! <3
I guess I need to read Bentley’s story…
And I need to read a few over again…and again…
I love Noble ??
That’s supposed to be !!
I remember reading Noble Pursuits more than 10 years ago. You sent it to me in MS Word. I probably need to read it again.
HAPPY ANNIVERSARY, cherish your husband he is, as they say, A Keeper. I was married 41 years to a man that was also a keeper. He also allowed me to be myself with all my faults, but loved me unconditionally. I lost him seven years ago & miss him every day.
Happy anniversary! Hope you two get to spend some extra special alone time with all the craziness you have going on in your lives right now. Loved Blessing Bentley. It was definitely worth the wait. I will admit that Tarnished Silver is my least favorite of your books, I just want to knock the heads of the main characters together! But I suppose I should give it another chance. I only read it right after it came out. Maybe it’ll grow on me…
Having a husband that doesn’t complain when you need to love your birth family and need to care for them is one of the greatest blessings I recieved when God put us together!!! Cherish it!
And I am so looking forward to reading all those unfinished books when they are finished.
Happy Anniversary! Bentley does step on toes, but I love her. I like this book so much that I actually spent the money to buy a print copy a few weeks ago when my husband was in the States for his mother’s funeral and I could get the book here without paying postage.
Happy Anniversary to you two!
Happy Anniversary, Chautona! Beautiful post. Thanks for the gentle reminders to not take our marriages for granted. I loved Blessing Bentley. Can’t wait to read the next one!