Cheryl Grey Bostrom's Blog, page 16

Sugar Birds, Birthing Stages

Lately, when I head outside, I practice a little Lamaze breathing.

Actually, a lot of Lamaze breathing.

Because labor contractions over Sugar Birds, my debut novel, are approaching a six on a scale of ten.

Here’s why:

Cover design and layout teams are finalizing details. Marketing and publicity teams are ramping up. Trade reviews are in the works. The book is beginning to show up online.

You can even preorder it now . . . but I hear that if you wait to order until a month or two before its August 3, 2021 release, your purchase will drive up the rankings of the book on various sales lists, which will land it in more locations on seller websites.

AND . . . in the biggest event this week . . . an award-winning, top-tier audiobook narrator has the book in her hands. I’m counting the days until I can tell you more about her—and until I can share samples of both the written and audio books.

Perfect for fans of The Scent Keeper, The Snow Child and The Great Alone, Sugar Birds immerses readers in a layered, evocative, coming-of-age story set in the breathtaking natural world, where characters encounter the mending power of forgiveness and the redemption of suffering—for themselves and for those who have failed them.

Truly exciting days ahead, with so, so much more to come.

Thanks for sharing it all with me.

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In the meantime, here are this week’s posts. Enjoy!

Roger, heaven. Copy that.

“Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.”

—Matthew 6:10

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Cold turtle.

“Then, at his command, it all melts. He sends his winds, and the ice thaws.”

—Psalm 147:18

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So. I kept my distance. Crept behind trees. Poked my long lens through branches.

They still spotted me.

“And no creature is hidden from his sight . . .”

—Hebrews 4:13

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Double-minded.

(Mt. Shuksan)

“Anyone who claims to be in the light but hates a brother or sister is still in the darkness.”

—1 John 2:9

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As every house waits.

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So glad you’re here.

Watching Nature, Seeing Life: Through His Creation, God Speaks

Bless The Birds

Bless the Birds: Living with Love in a Time of Dying, by Susan Tweit

I saw the book’s cover first—a high flock of birds soaring, silhouetted against a robin’s egg sky. The title spanned the same skyscape, immediately attracting me to the memoir Bless the Birds: Living with Love in a Time of Dying.

Then I learned that author Susan Tweit, a plant ecologist and naturalist, thrives on long, often solitary forays into unpeopled lands for regular doses of Vitamin N—her label for the nature that revitalizes and fuels her.

Of course, I could relate.

And since, as I write this, doctors are infusing a dear, long-time friend with trial drugs to treat her own advancing glioblastoma, the author’s courageous love through the long storm of her husband’s brain cancer held powerful immediacy for me.

So I wrote her and asked for an advance copy to review prior to the book’s April launch. When it arrived, here’s what I found:

The book opens gently, as Susan and her husband Richard embark on what will be their last road trip:

“. . . a belated honeymoon journey because our time together was short. Because we were determined to live every moment. Scanning Richard’s face, I was searching for grace, which to me is the ability to embrace life with a combination of balance, harmony and beauty. The ability to be present, heart open, even in—especially in—the moments when our hearts want to flinch, freeze, or turn away. When all seems lost: the wounded bird dies in our hands; the strayed child is not found safe and sound; the light of life on this animate planet flickers, as if to fade out.”

From there, she carries readers into scenes that are raw, intimate, and detailed, with pacing that’s important to a story like this. Kairos and chronos time overlap, leaping and lingering between memory and the immediate, between beautiful interludes and aching tedium and loss.

Susan holds nothing back. Her Richard is losing his stellar, loving mind—one surgery, one round of chemo, one round of radiation at a time. In painful, graphic exchanges, the once red-headed author hurls curses as she collides with her beloved husband’s decline, her own limitations, and their inability to change the ultimate course of the disease. In the same stretch of time, she loses her mother. Her grief and anger and exhaustion are palpable.

But there’s much more to the narrative than that.

Before I explain, you must know that I have developed a long practice of watching for God’s kindness and care in a world broken by all kinds of death. I spend significant time spotting his sweet gifts to those who trust Him, those who don’t, and those who are uncertain about Him. Looking for ways his principles and design can equip all of humankind to deal with adversity and loss here in this world, should people choose to embrace them.

And embrace them Susan does. While this is not the memoir of a Christ-follower coming to terms with eternal life, Susan and Richard, with her Quaker and his Buddhist practices, employ what I recognize as God’s common grace, available to us all. Throughout the dying, they commit to loving well. They choose gratitude and other-centeredness, cherishing family, friends, and each other. They live together attentively. Listen fully. They seek out nature’s winsome beauty in birds and animals, landscapes and stone. With awe, they value the universe and its inhabitants, and the science that explains how it functions.

As they do, they make their final season together as meaningful as they humanly can—in the world Richard leaves all too soon.

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And, gathered here, are other posts from earlier this week:

Cat’s Claw Moon.

“Then Jonathan said to him, ‘Tomorrow is the new moon. . . ‘”

—1 Samuel 20:18

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Air bnb.

“Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”

—Matthew 5:3

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Carpe diem.

“But encourage one another daily, as long as it is called ‘Today,’ so that none of you may be hardened . . .”

—Hebrews 3:13

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This morning. Grateful.

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And this . . .

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Common Grace.

But I say, love your enemies! Pray for those who persecute you! In that way, you will be acting as true children of your Father in heaven. For he gives his sunlight to both the evil and the good, and he sends rain on the just and the unjust alike.

—Matthew 5:44-45

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Thanks for stopping by, friends. So glad you’re here.

Watching Nature, Seeing Life: Through His Creation, God Speaks.

A Barn and Two Debuts

I snapped our neighbor’s barn a couple of times during Christmas week, as snow and fog shrouded its 1890’s frame.

When I awoke yesterday, however, the structure lay flattened—toppled by a night-long gale. The owners roused predawn to its thundering collapse, not an hour before the storm blew itself out.

One minute, a long-familiar view; the next, a farm forever changed.

The windstorm—and the barn’s startling demise—reminded me that a single moment . . . or hour . . . or day . . . can transform a landscape—and people—for better or worse. In December I read two debut, contemporary Christian novels that illustrate how.

In The Sowing Season by Katie Powner, 63-year-old Gerrit Laninga finds himself adrift after irrevocable change: in the span of a few minutes, he signs sale documents for the dairy that has held him captive since his brother’s death—an event that froze him in time and alienated him from his family. In a domino progression, his newly freed-up hours allow 15-year-old Rae Walters to enter his life. Paralyzed by her own fears, she offers Gerrit a chance to thaw them both.

Now I’m the wife of a dairy veterinarian, and I live a short drive from the story’s setting. No surprise that the novel’s concept drew me. I am not averse, however, to setting aside stories that don’t hold me. Time’s too precious to spend on books that don’t resonate.

But this one did. With humor and finesse, the author (who draws all of the book’s characters well) excels with protagonist Gerrit. He’s beautifully dimensional, and came to life on the page so vividly that if he walked into our home, I would know him instantly—and would empathize with his deepest yearnings.

A heartwarming, well-written debut.

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In Amanda Cox‘s debut novel The Edge of Belonging, homeless Harvey James’s discovery of an abandoned newborn also initiates a life-changing trajectory. His story intertwines with that of Ivy, who, cowed by an abusive fiancee, seeks truth about her life from fragments of her deceased grandmother’s past.

Curious about the logistics of how a lonely homeless man would care for an infant, and sympathetic to Ivy’s plight, I followed clues through the gently suspenseful dual narrative to a surprising, satisfying conclusion.

How’s that for vague? Intentionally so. You’ll enjoy the story more without spoilers. Know, too, that you’ll stand in shoes of both adoptees and homeless people who defy categorization—and that you’ll be the richer for it.

An inspirational novel with characters motivated by the yearning for family and truth that readers of Christian fiction will enjoy.

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And IN AN EGGSHELL, here are photo posts that appeared elsewhere this week:

When a serpent roars.

“And the great dragon was thrown down…”

—Revelation 12:9

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Winter wardrobe.

.”When it snows, she has no fear for her household…”

—Proverbs 31:21

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Hover.

“The Spirit of the Lord will rest on him— the Spirit of wisdom and of understanding, the Spirit of counsel and of might, the Spirit of the knowledge and fear of the LORD— and he will delight in the fear of the LORD.”

—Isaiah 11:2-3

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Archaeology.

“He uncovers the deeps out of darkness and brings deep darkness to light.”

—Job 12:22

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Thanks for reading, friends. So glad you’re here.

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Watching Nature, Seeing Life: Through His Creation, God Speaks.

After Christmas

We hadn’t seen them since the summer solstice. So when they arrived* from California in November, we made up for lost time, celebrating

a birthday,

Thanksgiving,

and, in our short week together,

an early Christmas.

When they returned home, a chunk of my heart went with them.

The afternoon they left, the doldrums landed me at my desk, pencil in hand, scratching “After Christmas” onto a notepad. The poem recently appeared in the winter edition of Awake Our Hearts, an online literary publication “for the female voice exploring faith and life in full..”

A month later, others came to us,* this time from the east coast. Given the cancellation of their March 2020 trip, we hadn’t been together in over a year. Again we celebrated.

Christmas.

New Years.

Family.

Wednesday morning they departed—and I found myself with that familiar Ache swirling through the cavern of their absence.

The same pain in those of you long-separated from people who give you reasons to breathe.

For you, I trust these lines will resonate.

After Christmas

Ache,
your velocity
rises with the drop
in my heart’s barometer.
No windbreaks here, you grow
to a howl in my mown
inner fields—low pressure zones,
short of breath because
those I love have
flown home again,
crossed state lines, and
my arms are empty.

Ache,
you swirl memory through
this hollowed home like snow,
proffer wintry options to
busy me in this
lonely weather.
You tempt me to numb you until
time can ice their visit,
dessicate our togetherness.

Blow past me, will you?
You and those evasions?
I’ll wait.
For Love will breathe
his holy Zephyr,
inflate the void,
resuscitate me with
positive pressure,
indwelling, warm,
as only He can do.

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* masked, quarantined . . .

And IN AN EGGSHELL, here are my posts from elsewhere, earlier this week:

Leviathan.

“The waters engulfed me . . .the watery depths closed around me . . .To the roots of the mountains I descended; the earth beneath me barred me in . . .My prayer went up to You . . .

And the LORD commanded the fish, and it vomited Jonah onto dry land.”

—Jonah 2: 5-7, 10

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Dendrites..

“Say to those with fearful hearts, ‘Be strong, do not fear; your God will come . . .'”

—Isaiah 35:4

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Limited visibility.

“What do you want me to do for you?” Jesus asked him. “Teacher,” the blind man answered, “I want to see again.”

—Mark 10:51

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Wishing you a 2021 with a sturdy perch…and a sunbath between storms.

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Thanks for joining me, friends. So glad you’re here.

Watching Nature, Seeing Life: Through His Creation, God Speaks

A Prayer for Orion

Touch this book carefully, readers. It may burn you.

Receive it tenderly. It’s made of mother heart.

Hold it with both hands. It bucks.

Read it with full attention. It’s a radiant witness to the grace and nearness of the living God.

The story is a nightmare. A testimony. A guide.

And author Katherine James weaves you through all three in this harrowing, redemptive memoir: A Prayer for Orion. In raw, limber prose she tells how her third child, Sweetboy, slid into the crevasse of heroin addiction. How she and her husband responded. How they felt. What happened next.

You may be tempted to escape the pain of this heart-rending story with judgment. I know, I know. It’s easier to stomach a terrible tale if you imagine you’d have avoided it all, had it been you. If you believe you could have controlled your child to safety with a new location or better friends or wiser parenting or more insight or deeper faith or a healthier diet . . . or . . . or . . . or . . .

Really?

If you disappear into rational, formula-driven solutions in order to dodge the book’s ugliness and sorrow, you’ll miss the rescue, the holy intervention, the healing. You’ll miss the humbling wonder of lives transformed by the only Rope long enough to pull Sweetboy from darkness and resuscitate him—and his parents.

I suggest you read it with mercy, instead. With a recognition that there, but for God’s grace—or in the midst of it—you and your child could have been. As I could have been with mine.

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And IN AN EGGSHELL, here are SM posts from earlier this week:

When you dot your eyes.

“Be very careful, then, how you live—not as unwise but as wise, making the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil.

—Ephesians 5:15-16

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Bullion.

“Fire tests the purity of silver and gold, but the LORD tests the heart.”

—Proverbs 17:3 NLT

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Wonders.

“And awe came upon every soul . . .”

—Acts 2:43

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Gambrel.

“Consider the ravens, for they neither sow nor reap; they have no storeroom nor barn, and yet God feeds them.”

—Luke 12:24

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THIS LIFE WE SHARE

I walk a lot. And though often it’s just my dogs and me out there, some of my favorite, most memorable hours are spent hiking fields, trails, and country roads with friends. They always show up beautiful, these women, and diverse: wise and honest. Humble. Vulnerable, curious, unique. Loving, interesting, funny, smart. Brave, devoted. Selfless. Authentic.

I now count author Maggie Wallem Rowe as one of them. Though our hikes were figurative rather than literal, we headed out together fifty-two times as I read each chapter of her new book: This Life We Share: 52 Reflections on Journeying Well with God and with Others.

Maggie’s a “woman of a certain age,” just as I am. Were I younger, I’d seek her out as a mentor—a relational trailblazer who could teach me, by her example, how to live out each of the traits I mention above. I’d buy her book as a trail-guide in which she addresses topics relevant for a lifetime: worry, faith, friendship, perseverance, joy, calling, pain, anxiety, busyness, parenting, grief, prayer . . . and many, many more, each filled with mile-markers of wisdom and humor.

But as her agemate, I’ll hold her book close as a sister, trusting her support and friendship, just as I would if she were joining me in person for a four-mile loop. I’ll again connect with her stories. Ponder her questions at the end of each reflection as if we were chatting. I may even answer her aloud—about life and love, failings and hopes, repentance and renewal.

I’ll hear her encourage me to press on.

Thank you, Maggie. I hope your book arrives like a welcome visit under trees and in stockings everywhere.

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And, IN AN EGGSHELL, here are SM posts from earlier this week:

Fall Fringe.

“True, the grass withers and the wildflowers fade, but our God’s Word stands firm and forever.”

–Isaiah 40:8 MSG

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Swan Ellipsis. (See it?).

“No eye has seen, no ear has heard, and no mind has imagined what God has prepared for those who love him.”

—1 Corinthians 2:9

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GPS.

“By your words I can see where I’m going; they throw a beam of light on my dark path.”

—Psalm 119:105 MSG

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Ombré.

“And isn’t long hair a woman’s pride and joy? For it has been given to her as a covering.”

—1 Corinthians 11:15

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HAPPY BIRTHDAY, GOOSE RIDGE

Relentless

Ever read Redeeming Love?

Twenty years ago I read that remarkable novel by Francine Rivers, where characters’ lives paralleled those in the book of Hosea. Ever since, the biblical story of unfaithful Gomer and her steadfast husband has intrigued, sobered, and inspired me.

So, when given an opportunity to read an advance copy of Sharla Fritz’s God’s Relentless Love: A Study of Hosea, I happily agreed.

Note: this book is an eight-lesson study of a book from the Bible’s Old Testament, in which the prophet Hosea, at God’s direction, marries the prostitute Gomer. Despite her adultery, Hosea pursues her, loves her, and brings her back to the home they share with their children.

To many, the prophet’s behavior sounds extreme, even incomprehensible. How could any man continue to treasure and adore a woman unapologetically prostituting herself? Why does he pursue, rescue, redeem and restore her, given her painful, blatant betrayal?

But then, why does God pursue, rescue, redeem, and restore us from ours?

As author Sharla Fritz works through the chapters of Hosea, she transcends centuries, drawing parallels between God’s faithfulness to idolatrous Israel, Hosea’s commitment to whoring Gomer, and—via a variety of contemporary illustrations—God’s relentless love of unfaithful you who are reading this and of idolatrous me who’s writing it.

Systematically, she guides readers away from scoffing at Hosea’s ridiculous devotion to his undeserving wife, and into a place of profound gratitude for his faithfulness, a place of recognition that without the relentless love of God that Hosea personifies, Gomer would be toast.

And so would we.

The author has structured the book so that you can plumb the depths of God’s love with a surface diver’s snorkel and fins, or engage with saturation diving gear that includes deep water patience and surrender. Spend enough time with this story, and you may find yourself in a hyperbaric chamber of grace, recovering from the bends of your own sin and shame and—at long last— learning to “Live like you’re loved.”

It’s a valuable, growth-inducing study. Groups or individuals working through these lessons will not emerge unchanged. 

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And, IN AN EGGSHELL, here are other SM posts from earlier this week:

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Goobye, November.

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Born in a barn. .

“And this will be a sign for you: you will find a baby wrapped in swaddling cloths and lying in a manger.”

—Luke 2:12

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In sheep’s clothing.

“But test everything that is said. Hold on to what is good.”

—1 Thessalonians 5:21

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“He’s wild, you know. Not like a tame lion.”

C.S. Lewis, The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe

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Brand new baby of a day.

His mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning…”

—Lamentations 3:22-23

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All Shall Be Well

I made the mistake of reading Catherine McNiel’s All Shall Be Well on a camping trip—without a pen or highlighter handy.

Result? Dog ears. Many dog ears.

By the time I finished, the bent pages were not unlike biblical stacks of stones, each marking an intersect with God—and unveiled by a writer so aware, so present, that I found myself catching my breath with awe.

Needless to say, I’d hike with this author any day, just to hear her connect the rhythms and details of the natural world to God’s tender nearness, wisdom, sovereignty, power and love. Throughout All Shall Be Well, she mines the created world, connects it to daily life, and extracts holy gems of wisdom and truth I want to carry in my pockets—and in my bones.

Please read this book only when you’ve shut impatience in a drawer, when you’ve banished your hurry to the basement. This book warrants a meditative pace, a lingerer’s style, a fine diner’s palate. Chew slowly and well. You’ll be nourished and blessed.

This is a book I’ll return to often.

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And IN AN EGGSHELL, other posts from this past week:

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When you’re gassed.

“But those who hope in the LORD will renew their strength.”

—Isaiah 40:31

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Exposed.

“He will bring to light what is hidden in darkness and will expose the motives of the heart.”

—1 Corinthians 4:5

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Forecast: rain, you say?

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One Degree of Freedom

I can’t imagine that Taryn Hutchison, while writing her new novel One Degree of Freedom, ever guessed that its November 17th publication would be so timely.

But timely it is. Arriving smack in the midst of the USA’s churning, the book drops readers into 1987 Romania as the dictator Ceaușescu’s oppression and censorship foster corruption, dehumanize society, steal privacy and create pervasive mistrust and secrecy.

I didn’t want to be there. Fortunately, the author quickly attached me to her authentic, engaging protagonist Adriana and a host of well-drawn characters. Throughout the suspenseful, tightly plotted, and conceptually accurate narrative, I yearned for their safety, even as I celebrated their resilience and love.

Invested, I stayed up late to finish this one. Had to see how freedom—of speech, of worship, of mobility—and the chilling loss of it—affected these people I cared about. Had to learn how and where they found respite.

It’s a compelling story about choice and imagination, faith and fear, and is sure to engage adults and young adults alike. I hope this book finds its way into schools far and wide.

And I pray we take its cautions to heart.

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And IN AN EGGSHELL, here are SM posts from earlier this week:

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When you just need a promise.”

I am he who will sustain you.”

—Isaiah 46:4

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When teens jump the fence.

Remember not the sins of my youth . . .Remember me in the light of your unfailing love, for you are merciful, O LORD.

—Psalm 25:7

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Let your imagination run.

“The hair on his head was white like wool, as white as snow, and his eyes were like blazing fire. His feet were like bronze glowing in a furnace . . . .”

—Revelation 1:14-15

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Hangers-on.

“But Lot’s wife looked back, and she became a pillar of salt. “

—Genesis 19:26

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GIVEAWAY!

Searching for Mom

Within a few pages of Sara Easterly’s award-winning memoir Searching for Mom, I suspected this author would reach far beyond her narrative as an adopted daughter searching for connection with her adoptive and biological mothers.

And she does, with beautifully written, courageous, and wise insights. With humility and profound authenticity.

For as long as she can remember, the original abandonment Sara experienced when her birth mother relinquished her colored not only her relationships, but her very sense of self. Until, via a holy recipe of suffering and love, she emerged from her chrysalis of isolation. To avoid spoilers, I’ll let her tell you how she did it. The story’s rich, lively, heartbreaking, humorous.

But there’s more. As expert story-tellers do, Sara gave me more than a good narrative. She hauled me beneath the engaging story of her growth from child to adult woman to mother of Olive and Violet and helped me explore motives and attachments, resentments and misunderstandings, longings and love that mothers and daughters everywhere encounter, but too seldom explore head-on.

Whether you’re a mother or a grown daughter, adopted or not, this book will heap your plate. And if you are both? You’ll find touch-points in Sara’s story for examining generational trails that shape families. You’ll experience empathy for both Sara and her birth mom, and in so doing will find yourself in tears, sitting at the door of mercy, infused with courage to improve your closest relationships.

I sure did.

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And IN AN EGGSHELL, here are social media posts from earlier this week:

Before leaves were past tense.

“Remember the former things . . .”

—Isaiah 46:9

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I’m listening.

“Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts.”

—Hebrews 4:7

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If fisticuffs were vapor.

“In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world.”

—John 16:33

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Okay, Readers. Learning as I go…

GIVEAWAY!! [image error]