November 2nd, 2018

Dear Loyal Readers,

I have a confession to make. I’ve decided to keep a secret from you. But not for forever—I promise! I’m still going to tell you now, as the secret unfolds. I just won’t post it for you until later. Don’t hate me! I’m just not ready to share quite yet. I love you guys, but it is the internet, and sometimes a girl needs to not open her whole heart to the whole world. Soon, I promise!

The secret is that I’m writing a new book. Yep. You’ve been asking me for one ever since I published He’s Making Diamonds. And here is it! It took me a few months to start it, but for it to be the best it could be, I knew I needed to wait until I was ready. The good news is that I am now! It’s called Light After Darkness and it’s about recovering from a long-term illness.

On Tuesday, a friend messaged me, telling me how she was struggling with healing. I tried to comfort her, and I’m not sure I was too successful. She went to bed, and I did what I always do: I wrote an article from that conversation. And it kept going. And going. And going. By the time I’d finished it, I realized that I thought I might finally be ready. So I prayed for a few days, and today I started writing.

And y’all? Oh my goodness does it feel so good to be back in a rough draft. Where anything can happen. Where it is safe and cozy. Where I’ll probably laugh and cry and beat the floor with frustration and then jump up and dance around the room with joy and victory as I hit benchmarks and beat words into submission.

Opening the document feels a little bit like home. I can almost smell it.

As of today, the first official day of beginning to write the rough draft (though this book has been coming on for a while now), it has 2,000 words. Funny… between that and blog posts, I’ve written more than the crazy NaNo people are supposed to the last two days. (But no, I’m not doing NaNo 😉 )

Now that I’m doing this, I’m so excited to share this with you when the time is right! I already started recruiting alpha readers.

Sorry about the secrecy, update you soon!

Sara

November 3rd, 2018

Dear Readers,

I’m exhausted, but delighted and wondering. Somehow, by God’s loving grace the book is now at over 7,000 words long. Yep. 7,000+  That’s an introduction, chapter one, chapter two, and part of chapter three. Isn’t that crazy? Especially since I felt so sick yesterday, and my mom and sister left town today, and I did some rehab that should have really drained me, and I haven’t slept much . . . God is so amazing!

My friend Esther described it the best: “Girl, it’s like you shook a pop bottle and then opened it!”

I’ve been waiting to write this book for a while, and suddenly out of nowhere, here it is! It’s . . . crazy. Completely crazy. But God must have a plan I don’t know about. Anyway. It’s late. But I figured I should keep up to date on my updates for y’all.

Shoutout to Beckie, Natalie, Kristin, and Esther for the virtual dessert.

Goodnight,

Sara

November 16th, 2018

Me: I’m going to reach 15,000 words tonight. I’m only a few hundred off!
Also me: *stares at the screen while falling asleep, completely disgusted with the words coming out* Yeah, nevermind, I’m going to bed.

Dear Loyal Readers,

Today, I finished the hardest (and longest) chapter to write so far. Likely the hardest any of them will be when it comes to emotions. It was so painful. I’ve been working on this chapter all week, and all week I keep getting hit with waves and stabs of hurt and memories.

The thing was, even though I’ve been hurting for a long time as everything has accumulated, the deeper hurt that came while writing this chapter seemed to break off chunks of the pain wrapping my heart, making it slip away. Or at the very least, softening it. It was so healing. I am learning so much.

When I told a friend about it, she replied, “It’s funny. You always said you needed to heal in order to write this book. But maybe you needed to write this book in order to heal.”

I think she’s right. I’m really praying for those who will read this book. Writing this has been so different from writing He’s Making Diamonds. Like . . . it almost feels too easy. My dad did point out that, you know, I’m no longer on death’s door and maybe that has something to do with it. 😉

It’s weird, though. It’s like I’m writing things that I won’t fully understand until a later date. *shrugs* I love being back in a rough draft. It is so much fun and freeing. I’d also somehow forgotten how awesome and fun alpha readers can be. Keeping this a secret is proving agonizing at times too! Soon.

I have so many more half-formed thoughts, but I’m so tired, so yet again I will bid you goodnight.

Adios Amigos,

Sara

P.S. I used the word “so” three times in that last sentence. I really wonder what these updates will be like when I read them at a later date. So far I’ve mostly written them at night after a long day (or three) of writing. XD

November 18th, 2018

Dear Loyal Reader,

Today and yesterday have been weird days. So many mixed highs and lows, victories and struggles, realizations and emotions. It’s strange it took so long, but today I cried for the first time while writing this book. I mean, literally writing and crying at the same time. I’ve definitely cried throughout the season of this book coming into being, but this was the first day for Light After Darkness that I cried while writing. With He’s Making Diamonds, it was a semi-common occurrence. Guess that makes it official. I’m pouring my heart into this book, too. 🙂

Anyways, in other news, I reached 20,000 words today! I’ve written an introduction, the first five chapters, and then I skipped ahead to work on chapter eight, which is now almost done. And I was even much busier today, not to mention I’m finishing a few hours earlier than usual in writing. It’s Jesus. 😉

I’m hoping to write more this week, but probably not as much as the last few days, so if I don’t update you soon, have a good Thanksgiving!

In Christ,

Sara

December 4th, 2018

Me: *writes all about forgiveness*
Also me: *gets up from writing about said topic, someone treats me poorly, and I stew for 10 minutes, giving them the silent treatment*
Still me: *repeats process a few hours later*

Dear Loyal Readers,

It’s been a long time since I last updated. And to be honest, though I’ve written a bit, I haven’t written a ton in between then and now. Of course, there was Thanksgiving and all that, and various holiday activities, plus you know, I am hosting a conference whose registration opened up yesterday . . . but you decide: is that a good enough excuse? Cause I can add school and healing from a long-term illness if that helps.

Today, I finished chapter 8, almost finished chapter 7, added bits and pieces everywhere, and reached 25k words and 55 pages. So I’m rather pleased and deeply appreciative of God’s grace and mercy and guidance.

I’ll share a quote. I didn’t actually write this one today but rereading it this evening prompted some thoughts. First, the quote: “But now is the time to make a stand. To finish this season giving our all. Sometimes that means crying on the bathroom floor. But we can do this! The Lord helping, we will make it through, and not just in survival but thriving. We’re so close. We’re almost there. Let’s complete the end of this season is God’s grace and power and joy and fight. We may feel tired, but God is not. We may feel weak, but in God we can have the strength we had when this started — or even more.”

What kind of Sara wrote that? It’s so . . . hopeful and passionate and inspiring. As I told a friend, “I wrote so much of this… in such hurting and pain. Shouldn’t that paragraph be what most of it looks like? Writing about illness in HMD I think I was way more hopeful than I am writing about healing in this one.”

Writing Light After Darkness is such a mix of things. So often, the way I know I’m ready to write more is when the internal emotional, mental, relational, and even spiritual pain gets to a certain high level. Writing it, I keep going back and forth from “Fight! Win! In Jesus, we got this!” to “Did I mention healing hurts and is hard? What about that it hurts?” There’s so much I don’t yet understand. So much I’m still struggling with and wrestling through regarding healing and recovery.

“Healing hurts. And if you hide that fact everyone who is hurting won’t find hope in your words.” -A Good Friend of Mine

Balancing making it helpful for old readers, and still sharing the core foundations for new readers is also proving tricky. So many of the important truths from illness to healing overlap. It’s a tightrope.

In other news, I listened to a lot of music today, of which some precious songs made it onto the soundtrack for this book. Looking forward to sharing that with you too!

Goodnight,

Sara

December 14th, 2018

Dear Loyal Readers,

I did it. I passed 30,000 words. It took me four months to get that with He’s Making Diamonds. This time I did it in about six weeks. God has brought me so far. 30,000 words was actually the length of the first draft of HMD, too.  (Though the final draft was over 50,000.)This one isn’t quite done yet. Though it’s semi-close.

And I’m already so sad that the rough draft is almost done. Rough drafts are my favorite part, I’ve decided. At least I have Christmas and an awesome conference to look forward to in my gap month between writing the rough draft and editing. 🙂 😉

Thanks to the Red Kingdom for all the sprints — you know who you are.

I really, really hope God uses this book. He using it in my life . . . I pray He uses it in the lives of those who read it. I cried as I wrote today, but God is so good.

In other news, I did pretty good on my first government CLEP test practice today! If that’s not healing, I don’t know what is. And it’s my sister’s half-birthday —- happy birthday, sis! I love you. <3

Anyway. *totally didn’t think that word in Jess and Gabriel’s voices* Goodnight!

Your sister in Christ,

Sara

P.S. I love my alpha readers. A lot. They are awesome. If you see them around, tell them so.

December 16th, 2018

Dear Loyal Readers,

Welp. I passed 32k today. 🙂 And spent the morning sobbing. This healing thing is hard. But I don’t really have much to update. I sent my alpha readers chapter five today, and I finished writing chapter seven, and I got a lot done in chapter nine. But otherwise, I just added bits and pieces everywhere. 🙂

Love,

Sara

December 21st, 2018

Dear Loyal Readers,

I did it. I finished the rough draft of Light After Darkness. It hasn’t sunk it. And I’m not sure I’m ready for it to be done. Obviously, I’ll have a ton to add in the second draft that I just can’t now because of where I’m at in my own healing journey, but it’s become a safe place for me to heal. I don’t know if I’m ready to put it down for a month before editing again.

But it’s done! It took me seven weeks. He’s Making Diamonds took me four months. It’s crazy how different the two have gone on so many levels.

In a good way, though, I hope. Today I had the pleasure of quoting Tolkien, referencing Veggie Tales, and writing down my dedication. 😀

I hope you all enjoy the book! I’m going to tentatively guess it will come out in fall of 2019.

And I get to announce it to you really soon! No more secrets! (I think I’ve done a pretty good job keeping the surprise, what about you?

Merry Christmas to all and Happy Half-Birthday to Ainsley,

Sara

December 31st, 2018

Dear Loyal Readers,

Well? What do you think?!?! I FINALLY am sharing this burning secret. Ahhh! Thanks for sticking with me. You guys are great.

Happy New Year,

Sara

P.S. Today is the LAST day to sign up for the blog tour or launch team I’m hosting for an up and coming author! You can sign up here.