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Chautona Havig

Chautona Havig

Using story to connect YOU to the Master Storyteller

How Characters Influence an Author’s Life

by Chautona Havig · 7 Comments

Or:  How Willow Guilted Me into Work

On Tuesday, my daughter bought us two of the grocery store rotisserie chickens for dinner.  I remember her hinting strongly that we only needed one.  However, I like to use the leftovers for chicken soup and even on a half-empty house, one won’t cut it for two meals with my crew.  She dutifully bought what I asked.  Go Jenna.  (and can you please disobey me next time?)

Anyway. I was on the ball.  I had dinner planned for Wednesday night and then we would have chicken soup on Thursday.  That meant that I had to boil those birds, make broth, get the meat off the bones.  All in a day’s work. I mean, it’s not like I had to butcher the things!  They were cooked when I started!

I had another daughter (I have a superfluity of daughters–something for which I am very grateful) dump them in the Dutch oven and start the boil.  And they did.  For a long time (because we all forgot about them).  My husband turned off the heat before he went to bed.

A couple of hours later, I remembered them.  Gulp.  Surely they were cold and probably unsafe.  Yes.  Of course they were.  We’d forget the fact that I’d be reboiling it all before we ate it. Right.  Didn’t need to do it.

I worked on Past Forward for a little longer until the guilt nearly strangled me.  Sigh.  So, instead of replacing the previously expunged “McDonald’s scene,” I went into the kitchen and tested the pot.  Still hot.  Drat.  Resigned to my fate, I began the tedious task of removing meat from bird bones.

It took me fifteen minutes tops.

Really, Chautona?

Sigh.

Does it say something horrible about me that my conscience knew the right thing to do but did not do it (Oh, dear… James 4:17 strikes again), but knowing that some woman who doesn’t exist at all would be shocked was enough to get me off the couch and into the kitchen?

It probably does.

Double sigh.

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Comments

  1. Rebekah says

    August 24, 2012 at 8:20 am

    LOL I think the funniest part of this post might have been imagining Willow’s reaction if you had just stayed where you were and left the stock! :p

    I’m enjoying rereading Willow by the way. And if the McDonald’s scene is the one I think it is, now I’m going to be on the lookout to see if you ultimately decided to keep it, or get rid of it. 😀

    To the KING be all the glory!
    Rebekah

    Reply
  2. Kristi Stapler says

    August 16, 2012 at 5:13 pm

    ROFLOL! Nodding my head in complete and total understanding!

    Reply
  3. Marylin F says

    August 16, 2012 at 3:56 pm

    Chautona,
    That is too funny… Thanks for sharing this.
    Question: Are you a late nighter? I’m in Oregon and many times late at night I get my emails from you and I thought you lived more in mid west.
    Also, I was driving around with my daughter the other day and we put in a cd. As I was listening to the song it made me think of Willow. Or how she would think of this change in her life. The song is by Tenth Avenue North (My nephew’s band) and it’s called – All The Pretty Things. If you’ve not heard it you should!! It talks about all the thinkgs that take us away from God. Enjoy! Marylin

    Reply
    • Chautona says

      August 16, 2012 at 4:00 pm

      I’ll have to go find that song!

      I am most definitely a night owl, but I’m west coast. California’s Mojave Desert.

      Reply
  4. Bethany Goff says

    August 16, 2012 at 6:51 am

    It’s good to know that you’re just as human as I am! And I appreciate you being so real with all of us. 🙂

    Reply
  5. barbara says

    August 16, 2012 at 6:01 am

    ROFLOL! I had a similar thought the other day when I wanted to buy $40 per bottle shampoo, thought about making some instead and then thought “Willow would NEVER buy that!”

    Reply
  6. Carla Linhart says

    August 16, 2012 at 3:30 am

    Sounds like Willow except she would have killed her chickens.

    Reply

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The Because Fiction Podcast

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Episode 583: A Chat with Elizabeth Goddard
byChautona Havig

Nothing kicks off an excellent suspense novel like a deathbed confession! Listen in as Elizabeth Goddard and I chat about her latest novel and learn more about the first book in the new Mercy Ridge series.

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I love a great series, and this new one by Elizabeth Goddard sounds awesome!

When the Silence Breaks by Elizabeth Goddard

A deathbed confession. A decades-old secret. A mountain that holds the answers–and danger closing in. When intelligence analyst Sarah Ellison learns of her grandfather’s deathbed confession connected to her brother’s murder, she’s determined to protect her remaining family. After further investigation, she discovers the disclosed information points to a decades-old government secret buried deep in the Cascade Mountains. With this knowledge, she looks for a guide who knows the terrain like the back of their hand. After his father’s death in a tragic mountain accident, former Navy SEAL Ryder Goodwin no longer guides for the family business. At first, Ryder refuses to help Sarah, but he sees the trouble chasing her and can’t stand by while someone brings danger to his small-town mountain community. Ryder and Sarah gear up to climb the mountain in a race against time and a looming storm. When the danger escalates, their search for answers shifts to a survival mission. Their only chance to make it through involves trusting each other and confronting the truth no one wants them to find. This gripping romantic-suspense thriller set in the Pacific Northwest from USA Today bestselling author Elizabeth Goddard is a series opener that will sweep you away in a rush of adrenaline.

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She never imagined becoming an ad hock mom to eigh She never imagined becoming an ad hock mom to eight at twenty-two, but Aggie Millikin is determined to do her sister proud. Or at least not cause said sister to beg God to take her out before she ruins said children's lives. From the revelation of her new responsibilities, through her own romance, into marriage, and then a difficult pregnancy, the Aggie's Inheritance series focuses on one young woman's determination to make a life pivot a beautiful one.
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She never imagined becoming an ad hock mom to eigh She never imagined becoming an ad hock mom to eight at twenty-two, but Aggie Millikin is determined to do her sister proud. Or at least not cause said sister to beg God to take her out before she ruins said children's lives. From the revelation of her new responsibilities, through her own romance, into marriage, and then a difficult pregnancy, the Aggie's Inheritance series focuses on one young woman's determination to make a life pivot a beautiful one.
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She never imagined becoming an ad hock mom to eigh She never imagined becoming an ad hock mom to eight at twenty-two, but Aggie Millikin is determined to do her sister proud. Or at least not cause said sister to beg God to take her out before she ruins said children's lives. From the revelation of her new responsibilities, through her own romance, into marriage, and then a difficult pregnancy, the Aggie's Inheritance series focuses on one young woman's determination to make a life pivot a beautiful one.
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