Janet Sketchley's Blog: Tenacity, page 91

Standing Together

Above all, you must live as citizens of heaven, conducting yourselves in a manner worthy of the Good News about Christ. Then, whether I come and see you again or only hear about you, I will know that you are standing together with one spirit and one purpose, fighting together for the faith, which is the Good News.

Philippians 1:27, NLT*

I’ve always taken the first part of this verse as a call to live like I believe the good news of Jesus—not to live cranky or fearful or hopeless, overwhelmed by...

Review: Night Watch, by Linda Hall

Night Watch, by Linda Hall (Linda Hall, 2014)

Captain Emmeline Ridge’s stint delivering a luxury sailboat from Canada to Bermuda is rudely interrupted when the owner’s daughter vanishes over the side in the middle of the night. The ship and crew are brought to Portland, Maine, for an investigation, but the complications have only begun.

Detective Ben Dunlinson, new to the Portland City Police and very new to all things nautical, seems competent despite rumours of past disgrace. The local sailin...

Meet Paul Daniels

Keeping secrets? Just a few.

Paul Daniels is sixteen years old and living a double life. If his mother knew he was playing in a band, she’d freak. So she won’t find out.

Paul needs the music like he needs to breathe. It’s something he inherited from his father. The only plus about Mom dragging him half-way across the country to start a new life is the chance to take guitar lessons from Mr. Morelli. Paul works after school at the music store to pay for lessons. And he’s in a new band with some f...

Encouragement for the Struggle

For I know that as you pray for me and the Spirit of Jesus Christ helps me, this will lead to my deliverance.

Philippians 1:19, NLT*

Paul trusts Jesus. He’s already been “saved” in the sense of being rescued from the penalty of sin. In context here, Paul is in prison and some of his enemies are trying to make that even harder for him. Likely the “deliverance” he’s thinking of is release from his chains.

If we belong to Jesus, we’re free from the power of sin and death, but there are still “chain...

Review: Ithaca, by Susan Fish

Ithaca, by Susan Fish (Storywell, 2014)

When your life revolves around your husband and his work, what do you do when you have to start over? Alone?

Ithaca is a coming-of-age story—for a 59-year-old woman.

Daisy Turner’s husband, Arthur, was a professor at Cornell University. She typed his notes and kept his home. And made soup for a crowd every Wednesday.

They married young, and Daisy found fulfillment as a wife and mother. Now her son works overseas, and she’s a widow. And most of her friends a...

Meet Carol Daniels

If you’ve read Heaven’s Prey,you may remember that Harry Silver has asister, Carol Silver Daniels. Secrets and Lies is Carol’s story, and it takes place chronologically between the final chapter of Heaven’s Prey and the epilogue.

Heaven’s Prey is psychological suspense, and pretty intense in places. Secrets and Lies has a lighter tone, and it’s romantic suspense. I hope you’ll enjoy it.

With Secrets and Lies releasing next month, I want to introduce some of my fictional friends. So… meet Carol...

The Long View

I pray that your love will overflow more and more, and that you will keep on growing in knowledge and understanding.

Philippians 1:9, NLT*

This prayer is Paul’s deepest longing for these people he loves. They’re enduring hard times, but he asks for this—not for relief from suffering, for health, protection or happiness. In verse 6, he expresses confidence that God will use even these hard times to complete what He has started in them.

He’s praying they’ll hold firm for their lifetimes, or until...

My Fiction: Update

I’ve been busy lately with final edits and formatting forSecrets and Lies, Redemption’s Edge book 2, which will release November 1. Soon I’ll be able to share the cover art with you… I can’t wait to see it. Christina Fuselli, who designed the cover ofHeaven’s Prey, is on the job, so I know it’ll be great.

Speaking ofHeaven’s Prey, I’m giving away a copy over at Everyone’s Story (ends Oct. 3). Just pop over and leave a comment to be entered to win. I encourage you to stop by anyway and check ou...

Character interview: Daisy Turner

Susan Fish is a Canadian author and editor as well as the principal of Storywell, an online resource for writers. Her new novel, Ithaca, releases October 1, 2014.

Susan Fish

Today I’m chatting with Daisy Turner, the main character of Ithaca.

Janet: Welcome, Daisy, and thanks for taking time to join us. First, let me offer my sympathy for your loss. Would you care to tell us a little about yourself, and about Arthur, too? You were married a long time, and you’re bound to have shaped each other al...

Intentional. Present. Contented.

The boundary lines have fallen for me in pleasant places;

surely I have a delightful inheritance.

Psalm 16:6, NIV*

I usually think of this verse in the context of counting my blessings, but it came back to me this weekend as I sifted through my gleanings from the 2014 LIFT retreat.

Before leaving home, I had opened two email devotionals that spoke about rest. The retreat theme was “Run YOUR Race,” yet those devotionals tuned me into God’s message for me.

Our retreat speakers shared many things, an...