#SaturdaySpotlight is on Shirley Raye Redmond & Courageous World Changers!

Good Morning and Welcome!

Well the writing retreat in Nacogdoches, TX I talked about on Wednesday was a great time. I doubled my word count on the current WIP. One friend met her goal of 10K words added to hers and the other finished and published a short story as well as added to her overall word count also! I absolutely love getting together with writers to actually write. Of course we took regular breaks to visit and brainstorm or simply get away to rest our minds but then we were right back at it and it paid off. Alas, now we're back to our normal routines juggling life and writing. But hopefully the inspiration will carry us through to completion of our individual projects.

Enough about me though!

Our guest has visited before, both on Wednesday Words with Friends AND in our Spotlight so I'm turning the blog over to her now. Take it away Shirley.....

Faithful Christian women are salt and light in their communities. They all make a difference. But some have such a vibrant faith that—like a stone tossed into a pond— their influence ripples throughout the world. The fifty women included in this book fall into that category. Each took seriously Jesus’ words in Matthew 28:18 that, "All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.”

Blessed with a variety of talents from writing and preaching, to teaching and nursing, these women used their gifts to glorify God. From aviators and athletes to musicians and mathematicians, many of them forged their faith in the fires of persecution, prejudice, and pain.

Several entered the mission field. Others took their faith into the world of politics and medicine. They were (and are) strong, smart, and sometimes outspoken. They recognized Jesus as Lord of everything—from arts and sciences to education and athletics. Brief cameos include Corrie Ten Boom, Mahalia Jackson, Harriet Tubman, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Sabina Wurmbrand and Ni Kwei-Tseng Soong and 44 other inspiring women.

Excerpt: Brave and adventurous at an early age, Elisabeth Elliot was only twelve when she prayed, “Lord, I want you to do anything you want with me.” She attended Wheaton College, where she studied classical Greek, hoping to translate the New Testament for unreached people groups. She married Jim Elliot in 1953. They joined four other families on the mission field in Ecuador.

While living with the peaceful Quecha tribe, Jim attempted to make contact with the Waorani—a violent tribe known for their revenge killings. Neighboring tribes called them Aucas or savages. When Jim and four others were killed, Elisabeth insisted, “This is not a tragedy. God has a plan and purpose in all this.”

Together with Rachel Saint, the sister of one of the murdered missionaries, Elisabeth took her toddler Valerie to the Waorani village, where they lived for two years in a tiny rain swept hut, eating roasted monkey limbs and other local fare. She hoped by forgiving those who’d killed her husband, she might teach them about God’s mercy and grace. Her courageous faith won several in the tribe to Jesus and inspired millions of Christians around the world. When

Elisabeth returned to the United States in 1963, the Waorani were no longer a violent culture. Elisabeth married again and began her speaking ministry across the United States. She also wrote twenty-four books, many of them inspirational bestsellers. Today, the tribe she evangelized continues to grow in the Christian faith.

Amanda Berry Smith

                (1837-1915)

                                      The Orphans’ Champion

Born a slave in Maryland, Amanda was one of thirteen children. Her parents were married, but lived on different plantations. Devout believers, they raised their children to love Jesus. At thirteen, Amanda performed the tasks of a housemaid. She was fifteen when her father purchased her freedom. Together they moved north to Pennsylvania.

Amanda married at seventeen. She endured poverty and hardship. Her husband enlisted in the Union Army during the Civil War, but never returned. Four of her five children died as babies. Her second husband died from cancer. Each tragedy drew her closer to God.

When Amanda began her preaching ministry, she joyfully distributed Bible tracts on street corners. She sang at revivals. For forty years, both black and white Christians invited her to preach at their events.

Amanda became instrumental in the Women’s Christian Temperance Union and helped to establish the National Association of the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). Despite her popularity, Amanda felt the sting of racism, saying, “I think some people would understand the quintessence of sanctifying grace if they could be black about twenty four hours.”

As her reputation grew, Amanda evangelized in Great Britain and India. She served as a missionary in Liberia in Africa for eight years. After returning to the United States, she raised funds to build an orphanage for destitute black children in 1899 in a small town near Chicago—the first establishment of its kind. She worked tirelessly for the rest of her life to support the orphanage.

An award-winning writer, Shirley Raye Redmond is the author of Courageous World Changers: 50 True Stories of Daring Women of God and three inspirational novels, PRUDENCE PURSUED, VIPER’S NEST, and AMANDA’S BEAU.

Her children’s book, LEWIS & CLARK: A PRAIRIE DOG FOR THE PRESIDENT (Random House) was a Children’s Book of the Month Club selection.

Shirley Raye holds an M.A. in literature and has been married to her husband Bill for over forty years. They live in New Mexico and are blessed with two grown children and four precious grandchildren. Touch bases at shirleyrayeredmond.com or Facebook.

Get your copy of Courageous World Changers at Amazon, B&N and Christian Book.com

Wow, Shirley, these sound like some very interesting stories! Good luck and God's blessings with the book!

Hope you enjoyed the post friends and that you'll check back each week for Wednesday Words with Friends and another Saturday Spotlight.

Until next time take care and God bless.

PamT

#WednesdayWordswithFriends welcomes Shirley Raye Redmond!

Good Morning!

Well we've made it through our first tropical storm of the season here in Louisiana. Although, Cristobal hit east of me, we still go on alert anytime something like this is in the Gulf. I pray all of you, dear friends, in Cristobal's path fare well. I've also noticed by some Facebook posts, our friends in the north are still getting some snow. Wow...send that cooler weather down here please. We need to keep our Gulf waters cool as long as possible!

N. N. Light's Book Heaven is hosting a huge audiobook promotion and giving away 5 gift cards (see sidebar to enter). Other than that, not too much else going on in my world so without much further ado, let me introduce to you my guest, fellow Pelican Book Group author, Shirley Raye Redmond.

Shirley is not brand new to our blog, but it's been quite a while since she was in our spotlight, so please give her a warm SWLA WELCOME!

An award-winning writer, Shirley Raye Redmond is the author of Courageous World Changers: 50 True Stories of Daring Women of God and three inspirational novels, PRUDENCE PURSUED, VIPER’S NEST, and AMANDA’S BEAU.

Her children’s book, LEWIS & CLARK: A PRAIRIE DOG FOR THE PRESIDENT (Random House) was a Children’s Book of the Month Club selection.

Shirley Raye holds an M.A. in literature and has been married to her husband Bill for over forty years. They live in New Mexico and are blessed with two grown children and four precious grandchildren. Touch bases at shirleyrayeredmond.com or Facebook.

Welcome, Shirley! Please share what words are on your heart today.....

Biographies Matter

When I was in 5th grade I read more than 300 library books and wrote a brief paragraph about each one. My teacher, Miss Cornelius and the school librarian were thrilled. At the end of the year awards assembly, they presented me with an embarrassment of prizes—including a lap desk with an assortment of pens, pencils, and writing paper inside. It was my pride and joy for a long time.

Looking back, I realize that many of the books I read that year were biographies. How
I loved learning about Annie Oakley, Dolley Madison, Amelia Earhart and Abigail Adams. Even now I still love reading biographies and memoirs. Why? There are several reasons.

Biographies bring history to life. World War II becomes more than dates and places when one reads about Corrie Ten Boom’s trials and tribulations in a concentration camp. Ecuador becomes vividly real when one reads about Elisabeth Elliot eating roast monkey while evangelizing the savage Waorani tribe. The battle for civil rights takes on flesh when one reads about little Ruby Bridges, who had to be escorted to elementary school by US Marshals.

Biographies make me want to be a better person. Reading about surfer Bethany Hamilton makes me want to be braver. Reading about Florence Nightingale makes me want to be more caring. Reading about Pandita Ramabai—a female Hindu scholar who converted to Christianity—makes me want to be bolder in my faith.

Biographies provide us with valuable life lessons. Young athletes and others cannot help but be encouraged by the life of runner Wilma Rudolph, who overcame crippling polio to go on to win gold medals in the Olympics. The musically inclined will admire Mahalia Jackson, who overcame poverty and prejudice to earn the title of gospel music queen. Although paralyzed and confined to a wheelchair, Joni Eareckson Tada’s experiences teach all of us about faith, prayer, and determination. She didn’t let her disabilities prevent her from achieving a reputation as a gifted mouth artist, talented vocalist, and author.

Christian biographies encourage us to keep running the good race. Living in a culture addicted to mediocrity, we need to be inspired by believers who struggled against sin and adversity to triumph in the end—people who served as salt and light in this troubled world.

Biographies should be a staple in our in our diet—especially in the diet of our children and grandchildren. As author Os Guinness has written, “…great lives do more than teach. They stir, challenge, rebuke, amuse and inspire at levels of which we are hardly aware.”

So when was the last time you read a good biography? Maybe it’s time to do so again. You won’t even have to write a book report.

Shirley's latest book, Courageous World Changers: 50 True Stories of Daring Women of God can be purchased at Amazon, B&N and Christian Book.com

Wow, Shirley, your post reminds me of the Vocational Biographies I wrote early in my career! Great information. Thanks for sharing!

Hope you enjoyed today's post friends and that you'll check back each week for Wednesday Words with Friends and Saturday Spotlight. Be sure and leave a comment to enter my monthly gift card giveaway!

Until next time take care and God bless.
PamT

#SaturdaySpotlight: Shirley Raye Redmond & Viper's Nest

Good Morning and Welcome to the first Saturday Spotlight of November 2015!

Today I'm pleased to bring you fellow Pelican Book Group author, Shirley Raye Redmond with her novel, Viper's Nest....

My romantic suspense novel Viper’s Nest (Harborlight/Pelican Book Group) is a set in Jacksonville, Illinois. Allan Partner, a handsome history professor and his widowed research assistant, Wren Bergschneider, find themselves in danger when they explore an old insane asylum slated for demolition, unearthing a scandal someone is willing to kill for to keep secret.

I actually had a private tour of the Jacksonville Insane Asylum many years ago before it was torn down. Mary Todd Lincoln was a patient there briefly following the death of President Lincoln. Built in the mid 1840s, the asylum was the product of humanitarian Dorothea Dix’s impassioned plea to the Illinois Legislature to provide care for the mentally ill. Miss Dix was a stalwart advocate for these individuals—many of whom were mistreated by society. Some were locked away in cellars and attics. Others were put on display in county jails. No medical aid or social services were available at the time for those declared insane. Everyone was lumped into the same category too—whether one was a cruel psychopathic killer or a melancholy young mother suffering from postpartum depression.  Dorothea Dix changed all that.

Interweaving both historical and fictional threads through the story plot was both a challenge and a thrill. I am hoping readers will enjoy both. Here’s an excerpt from the novel:

EXCERPT:

            Certainly there would be ghosts, even in broad daylight.

            That was Wren Bergschneider’s first thought as she stared at the ominous, ramshackle exterior of the state hospital, nearly two centuries old. Crunching across the carpet of fallen leaves, she tried to keep up with Professor Allan Partner, her employer, as he strolled around the exterior of the imposing structure taking photos.The edifice loomed over them, while Allan made a large, safe orbit, as if he feared the condemned building would suddenly suck them in.

            Jacksonville Insane Asylum. The words engraved in stone over the main entrance were no longer politically correct. Decayed, uninviting, and slated for demolition, the old place looked just like every asylum depicted in those old black-and-white horror movies.

            “Look at those windows,” Allan told her, pointing his digital camera for a shot.

            Wren glanced up. She thought of all the faces that must have once peered down to where she now stood. Sad, confused, guilty, young, and even vengeful faces, old and hopeless ones, too. How had those patients coped? She thought particularly of the women who suffered from what doctors now call postpartum depression, PMS, and various other hormonal imbalances. Confinement in places such as this had been their treatment in the nineteenth and early part of the twentieth century.

            “I keep thinking of Nellie Bly,”she told him.

            “So you finished reading Ten Days in A Madhouse?”Allan looked over his shoulder and quirked an eyebrow.

            Wren nodded. In 1888, the famous New York journalist had willingly allowed herself to be committed to a mental institution such as this one on Blackwell's Island. According to a plan devised by Nellie and her editor, Bly had feigned mental illness and was promptly declared insane by six doctors, who had examined her on the court's behalf. She was duly admitted to Blackwell's and for ten days endured a horrible nightmare. When her editor finally arranged for her release, Nellie wrote a startling feature article about the conditions at the asylum, which resulted in a grand jury investigation. The spunky Miss Bly later wrote a book about her unforgettable adventure.

            “And now you’re following in her footsteps,” Allan said with a half smile.           

            “Hardly! I’m not that daring,” Wren admitted.

            Once, she’d considered herself to be, if not daring, at least strong and capable. But since the death of her husband, Peter, last year in a car accident, she felt rather weak and vulnerable. Only the necessity of caring for her eight-year-old daughter kept her from succumbing to fear about her future.

 

AUTHOR BIO:

 

An award-winning writer and occasional conference speaker, Shirley Raye Redmond is the author of two dozen children’s books, five clean romances, and more than 400 magazine and newspaper articles, which have appeared in a wide variety of publications including Focus on the Family, Shotgun Sports, and Woman’s Day. Shirley Raye holds an M.A. in literature from the University of Illinois. She has been married to her husband Bill for more than 40 years. They have two grown children, two grandsons, and a feisty Scottish terrier named Duncan. Find out more about Shirley by visiting her Website and connecting with her on Facebook.

Get your copy of Viper's Nest at Pelican Book Group, Amazon or Barnes and Noble.     

Hope you enjoyed this week's spotlight! Check back weekly for Tuesday Treasure, Thursday Thoughts and Saturday Spotlights!

PamT