Beth K. Vogt's Blog, page 77

In Others’ Words: Spine Poetry

Spine Poetry by Anne Payne: Whodunit?

It’s getting late on Thursday night. I’m not feeling particularly productive or creative … and there’s a blog post to write.

So I’m taking advantage of others’ creativity and sharing some of the Spine Poetry fun that’s been happening on my Author Facebook page. I’ve run into some incredibly imaginative people this past week — and they’ve all created some fun, inspiring and thought-provoking Spine Poetry.

What is Spine Poetry, you ask? It’s a poem made by using the titles on book spines. Take a look:

Spine Poetry by Sonia Meeter: A 3 Act Life

 

This one by my friend, Sonia Meeter, had me laughing!

 

 

 

Spine Poetry by Megan Wilson: Stranger Online

Megan Wilson’s Spine Poem has a “techno” feel to it. And author Keli Gwyn’s Spine Poem tells a beautiful story.

Spine Poetry by author Keli Gwyn: Journey to a Saving Faith

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

You can read more Spine Poetry on my Author Facebook page or Pinterest Board.

In Yours Words: What have you done that’s made you feel creative this week? Feel like writing a Spine Poem? Send it to me at beth@bethvogtcom and I’ll share it with my readers on Facebook and Pinterest! Join the fun! You just may win a $10 Amazon gift card!

What have you done that’s made you feel creative this week? Click to Tweet

Spine Poetry Competition: Win a $10 Amazon Gift Card Click to Tweet

Rafflecopter Giveaway: Celebrating Book Clubs, Readers & Romance Click to Tweet 

In Others’ Words: Surprise

Obviously, this week’s quote refers to those wonderful surprises that cause a smile to burst across our face … and maybe even cause our feet to tap out a hApPy DaNcE … our fingers to fast dial our spouse or closest friend …

Those kinds of surprises.

They can be as simple as an unexpected, but oh-so-needed rainbow curving across a still damp from the rain sky.

Or as complex as finally … finally seeing your dream come true. That dream you whisper right before you blow out the candles on your birthday cake … or toss a penny in a wishing well … or offer a prayer for one more time because you know that you know that you know that God’s ears are open to your prayers …

In Your Words: What surprised you this week? 

Embracing the gift of surprise Click to Tweet

Opening our eyes to the gift of surprise Click to Tweet 

Speaking of Book Covers: Somebody Like You (May 2014)

I’m in love with the cover for my May 2014 release, Somebody Like You!

And yes, developing this cover included wonderful give and take with my editor and the talented people in the art department at Howard Books.

My heroine, Haley, is beautifully rendered — and there’s subtle symbolism woven into her depiction too. And once again, we’ve retained the title and author name style that was begun with Wish You Were Here and Catch a Falling Star. One more thing: I love the look of the Colorado landscape!

Somebody Like You asks the question: Can a young widow fall in love with her husband’s reflection?

In this beautifully rendered, affecting novel, a young widow’s world is shattered when she meets her late husband’s identical twin—and finds herself caught between honoring her husband’s memory and falling in love with his reflection.

Haley’s whirlwind romance and almost three-year marriage to Sam, an army medic, ends tragically when he is killed in Afghanistan. As she grapples with widowhood and the upcoming birth of her son, her attempts to create a new life for herself are ambushed when she arrives home one evening—and finds her husband waiting for her. Did the military make an unimaginable mistake when they told her that Sam had been killed?

After a twelve-year estrangement, Stephen hopes to make things right with his brother—only to discover Sam died without revealing Stephen’s existence to Haley. As Haley and Stephen struggle to navigate their fragile relationship, they are inexorably drawn to each other. Haley is unnerved by Stephen’s uncanny resemblance to Sam, and Stephen struggles with the issue of Haley loving him as Stephen—and not as some reflection of his twin. How can Haley and Stephen honor the memory of a man whose death brought them together—and whose ghost could drive them apart?

Somebody Like You reminds us that while we can’t change the past, we have the choice—and the power through God—to change the future and start anew.

In case you didn’t know, I’m a twin, which was one of the catalysts for this book. Any other twins out there? 

Cover Reveal: Catch a Falling Star by Beth K. Vogt Click to Tweet

Speaking of Book Covers: Somebody Like You Click to Tweet

 Read the first chapter of Catch a Falling Star by Beth K. Vogt! Click to Tweet

 

 

The Making of a Book Cover: Catch a Falling Star

There’s a lot I like about being an author with Howard Books. A lot.

One of the things I appreciate the most? My editor, Jessica Wong, and the art director, Bruce Gore, invite me to participate in discussing the covers for my books. It’s an interesting process to get from my manuscript all the way to a cover that represents the story I’ve written — and it usually takes several attempts before we’re all satisfied.

What did the process look like for my most recent release, Catch a Falling Star?

CAFS Cover Suggestion #1

1. Here’s an early cover suggestion: This idea carried over the same style for my name and a similar style for the title as was used in my debut novel Wish You Were Here — and I liked that. I also liked the falling star in the background. However, the woman representing Dr. Kendall Haynes, the heroine of Catch a Falling Star, seemed younger than 36 (a major issue for Kendall in the book), and the house didn’t accurately represent Kendall’s loft-home, situated within her medical office.

 

CAFS Cover Suggestion #2

2. A second cover suggestion: Once again, there’s the similar script for my name and the title, as well as the falling star in the sky. The hitch with this cover? The guy and the girl in this cover were having too much fun together! If you’ve read Catch a Falling Star, you know Kendall and Griffin Walker, the hero, start off more antagonistic than romantic. So, I couldn’t see the whole “walking in the flowers” scenario.

3. And a third cover suggestion: 

With this cover rendition, we all felt as if we were closing in on the cover for Catch a Falling Star. The title font more closely matched the title for Wish You Were Here. I love the purple and the midnight blue colors, as well as the realistic night sky with the falling star. And the addition of the Jeep was perfect, since Kendall is a Jeep girl. The background also looks as if she’s looking out over Colorado Springs, CO — where the story takes place.

CAFS Cover Suggestion #3

With just a few tweaks — Kendall’s hair color and the color of the Jeep — we ended up with the final cover for Catch a Falling Star!

So there you have it: The making of the cover for Catch a Falling Star! What did you think? 

The making of a book cover: Catch a Falling Star Click to Tweet

The creative process of book covers Click to Tweet 

Celebrating Book Clubs, Readers & Romance Click to Tweet 

In Others’ Words: Love is …

I’ve come across many a “Love is …” attempt to define an emotion that is, in essence, undefinable. Even the “Love is patient, love is kind … ” distillation so often read during wedding ceremonies, often stumps me before I get very far into the verses in 1 Corinthians 13.

Love is patient … kind … it does not envy … 

Wait. If love is the doing of all those things (and I’ve only mentioned three), then love is, indeed both stern and splendid — and so much more than mere kindness.

I can be kind to a stranger by letting someone go ahead of me in line at Target or by taking the time to reunite a lost puppy with its owner (as my husband and youngest daughter did yesterday).

Being kind doesn’t even demand that I know your name, much less that you know mine.

But love … ah, love demands so much. Loving someone in a “’til death do we part” kind of way is stern, unrelenting — a love that finds the strength to get up off its knees and say, “I’m not done yet. We’re not done yet.”

And love is splendid … it surprises you with joy, the kind that comes in the morning after you’ve wept all night in your pillow. Nothing has changed, the troubles are still there …

and  so is the One who loves you with an everlasting love — the one who keeps all your tears in a bottle. (Ps. 56:8)

Amazing thought, that.

Love asks for more from us … and gives so much to us.

Stern.

And splendid.

In Your Words: Love is ___________________________________. I would love to know how you would fill in the blank. 

Why Love is more than kindness Click to Tweet

When Love is stern & splendid Click to Tweet 

Read the first chapter of Catch a Falling Star by Beth K. Vogt! Click to Tweet

In Others’ Words: Live Well

It’s been a week.

A good week … but one of those fasten-your-seat-belts kind of weeks.

And I don’t know about you, but it’s Friday and I’m feeling all “Whew!” and “Whoa!” and “When can I have a nap?”

And then it came time to write this post. And I’m thinking: Which quote do I pick? How do I want to start the conversation with my friends?

I browsed my cache of “one day I want to use these” quotes — and my heart stopped on today’s quote.

It reminds me: Yes, it’s been a week, but:

I am blessed with life-giving friends.
I know what my guiding truths are — and I’m embracing them as never before.
My passion is fueling my dreams — and allowing me to hang out with other passionate people. So. Much. Fun.
Life is full — filled to overflowing!
And I am choosing to be well … to not let an ongoing health challenge define me.

In Your Words: It’s Friday. How ya feeling? 

“Live Passionately, and Fully and Well.” Click to Tweet

Life = Friends, Principles, Passion Click to Tweet

Giveaway: Celebrating Book Clubs, Readers & Romance! Click to Tweet 

Celebrating Book Clubs, Readers & Romance!

I’m looking forward to having some fun this month as I celebrate book clubs over on my Author Facebook page.

As I mention in the video, I love connecting with readers. I also helped start a Mother-Daughter Book Club several years ago with my youngest daughter, CJ, as well as visiting with several book clubs after Wish You Were Here released in 2012.

So in August, which is also National Romance Awareness Month, we’re going to:

host a Rafflecopter giveaway that includes the chance for a book club to win up to 10 copies of my newest release, Catch a Falling Star, as well as the chance to Skype with me and talk about the book (There’s a discussion guide in the back of CAFS).
offer readers and book club members the chance to win a preview of the first chapter to Somebody Like You, which releases May 2014.
create some “spine poetry” — stay tuned for more about that.
have some fun doing a craft or two — and if anyone wants to help this craft-challenged gal, let me know!

Looking forward to celebrating book clubs, readers and romance with you in August!

Have you ever belonged to a book club? What was your favorite book that you read? If you did belong to a book club, what book would you recommend reading?

Romance author Beth Vogt celebrates book clubs during August Click to Tweet

Celebrate book clubs, readers and romance with author Beth Vogt Click to Tweet

Read the first chapter of Catch a Falling Star by Beth K. Vogt! Click to Tweet

In Others’ Words: Thoughts

I went to college as a special education major.

I’d always had an interest in sign language and braille. And after visiting Gallaudet University, a college for the deaf and hard of hearing in Washington, DC, while writing a high school report, I selected special education as my college major.

That lasted all of one semester.

Why?

Because I asked myself this question: What one thing do I love enough that I wouldn’t mind doing it for the rest of my life?

The answer?

Writing.

I’d always loved words. Always loved writing. Always loved English in school — yes, even diagraming sentences, back when we did that.

And so, I changed my major to journalism — and never looked back.

Oh, sure, I put writing on the back-burner for a number of years as I figured out the whole mothering gig (and believe me, I had a lot to learn!). But in my heart, I was, and always had been, a writer.

Today’s quote spoke to that part of my heart — the truth that some things (reflected in our thoughts) never change. And that’s okay. Wait, it’s more than that. The  passions that don’t disappear — even if they have to be set aside for a season — those are the ones that reflect the you that God made you to be.

In Your Words: What do you think about every day? How does it fuel your dreams? 

Passion: Whatcha’ thinking about? Click to Tweet

How our thoughts fuel our dreams Click to Tweet

 

In Others’ Words: Chosen

God has picked me.

God has chosen me.

All those times I felt invisible . . . ignored . . . unwanted . . . less than . . .

God wanted me.

If only I had worried less about all the people I was trying to please, jumping up and down, waving my hands, shouting, “Hey! I’m over here! How am I doing?” — and stopped long enough to look up and realize the eternal, a-ma-zing Creator-God of the universe loves me.

All the time. 

No matter what.

What a difference it would have made back then … what a difference it makes now, every day, when I embrace the precious truth that God picked me.

“See, I have engraved you on the palms of my hands …” (Isaiah 49: 16 NIV)

In Your Words: When did you realize that God loves you — that he chose you? Do you have a special verse or quote that reminds you of this truth? I’d love to have you share it!

Chosen: God Has Picked You as His Very Own Click to Tweet

Feeling Overlooked? You are Chosen by God Click to Tweet

Read the first chapter of Catch a Falling Star by Beth K. Vogt! Click to Tweet 

 

 

In Others’ Words: Smallest

I am still trying to find the words to describe the birth of my granddaughter, Alison Elizabeth, on Wednesday, July 24.

I’ll let you know when I find them.

All of my emotions seem to find their expression in tears … and silence whenever I hold this miracle in my arms.

I’ll be spending Friday welcoming her home … and falling more in love.

In Your Words: When have you found yourself at a loss for words?

When the smallest things mean the most Click to Tweet

Love: At a Loss for Words Click to Tweet