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The Steve Laube Agency

Helping to Change the World…Word by Word

The Steve Laube Agency

The Steve Laube Agency

Helping to Change the World Word by Word

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Home » The Writing Life » Page 86

The Writing Life

Start the New Year Right

By Karen Ballon January 7, 2015
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I must have started this blog fifteen times. I’d write a word or a line, then delete it. All because I’m trying to think of something new and clever to say about the fact that we’re facing a new year. But you know what? There isn’t really anything new to say. Sure, publishing has changed, and will continue to change. Yes, books are being published and will continue to be published. How that will happen may change, but there is a fact that won’t ever change:

Publishing is about Story.

Fiction, nonfiction, it doesn’t matter. It’s all about story. About sharing our hearts and experiences and ideas with our readers. About communicating a message that God has planted deep in our hearts in the hopes that we will challenge, encourage, inspire…and maybe change some lives for the better. We write because God has whispered a truth to us, and done so in a way that we know it needs to be shared.  So today, let’s welcome 2015 by sharing that God-whisper.

Share the truth God put inside you, the core of your writing. And then let’s pray for each other. Let’s cover our fellow writers in prayer. I can’t think of a better way to start a new year.

My truth? That we must embrace the deep places in our lives, for God uses them to refine us, to make us into clearer reflections of His Son.

Your turn!

 

 

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Category: Art, Career, The Writing Life, Writing CraftTag: story, The Writing Life

Joy to the (Writer’s) World!

By Karen Ballon December 17, 2014
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The Christmas season is upon us. A time of delight and good cheer. A time overflowing with laughter, when we’re restored to carefree children filled with wonder. Right? Um…not so much. In fact, a number of folks have said how frustrated they are, how they’re behind on everything, and overwhelmed with all they should be doing. After all, it’s Christmas! And if they don’t get things done, Christmas …

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Category: Get Published, The Writing LifeTag: Christmas, Expectations, The Writing Life

Tis the Season for Stories!

By Karen Ballon December 10, 2014
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December has to be my favorite month of the year. I love all the preparations and decorations and celebrations for the Christmas season. But two of my favorite things about the Christmas season are the books and movies we savor every year because, for those of us in the Ball household, it just isn’t Christmas without: Books The Best Christmas Pageant Ever by Barbara Robinson. (“Hey! Unto you a …

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Category: Personal, The Writing LifeTag: Christmas, Stories

When Did You Know You Wanted to Be a Writer?

By Karen Ballon August 6, 2014
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Yesterday was my birthday. 57 years of life. It struck me yet again how quickly the days goes by. I swear it was just yesterday that I was a kid, canoeing on Diamond Lake, walking my dog to the used book store to buy my Thor comics (which I collected until my senior year in high school, and which, when I sold my collection, financed my first year of college), gathering with my pseudo-cousins after …

Read moreWhen Did You Know You Wanted to Be a Writer?
Category: The Writing LifeTag: Career, The Writing Life

The World Rages

By Dan Balowon July 29, 2014
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One hundred years ago this week, the Great War began. It was the war that was supposed to end all wars. The world decided it was about time to get all their anger out at once and then go back to living in peace.  Following the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand of Austria on June 28, 1914, Austria-Hungary and Serbia decided they had had enough of civility and started fighting.  A world war …

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Category: The Writing LifeTag: Faith, The Writing Life, Theology

Orphan Trains & Wild Stallions

By Guest Bloggeron July 28, 2014
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by Allen Arnold I recently read about the unexpected publishing success of Orphan Train.  It’s a novel set in present-day Maine and Depression-era Minnesota. This fifth book from Christina Baker Kline has turned out to be a sleeper hit of the year, with more than one million copies sold. I’m intrigued by the book’s premise. But it’s the subhead of the article that caught my attention.  “Unlikely …

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Category: Art, Guest Post, The Writing Life, TheologyTag: Art, Craft, The Writing Life

My Secret Writer’s Tool

By Karen Ballon June 18, 2014
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Guest post by Jennifer Sienes Jennifer Sienes, one of Karen’s clients, is a talented fiction writer who according to editors has a gift for bringing out the emotional power of the scene. She was recently named as a finalist in the 2014 Genesis contest with her novel Redemption. You can find out more and read her blog at www.jennifersienes.com   I’ve been reading the Steve Laube Agency …

Read moreMy Secret Writer’s Tool
Category: Career, Guest Post, The Writing LifeTag: Spouses, The Writing Life, Writing tools

Look Up!

By Karen Ballon May 21, 2014
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by Karen Ball A friend shared the video at the end of this blog with me in response to what I wrote here last week. I love the message, not just for me personally, but for anyone who seeks to touch people through their writing. Because really, how effective can we be in what we’re doing as writers if we don’t see and spend time with the people around us? We write about our “core audience” in our …

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Category: Get Published, Karen, The Writing LifeTag: Audience, The Writing Life

The Writer’s Pod

By Karen Ballon April 30, 2014
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When I was at the Mount Hermon Writers’ Conference a week or so ago, I went to one of my all-time favorite places: The Santa Cruz Wharf. It’s one of the best places to see the sea lions, which are draped all over the pilings of the wharf, as well as swimming and playing in the water around it. A few years ago, I saw something I’d never seen before. A group of sea lions all floating together. Come …

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Category: Career, Communication, Conferences, Creativity, Karen, Platform, The Writing LifeTag: Community, Conferences, The Writing Life

Spring is Here!

By Karen Ballon February 19, 2014
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A picture of a beautiful flower I took this morning in our garden.

It started two weeks ago. Little green sprouts poking up through the frozen, barren ground. Ground that, thanks to a winter of record-breaking cold, was so hard just a month ago that not even my shovel made a dent in it. So you can imagine my delight when I spotted those bits of green pushing their way through that same, dead …

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Category: Career, Craft, Karen, Personal, The Writing LifeTag: Career, Spring, The Writing Life
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