Author: stephaniehurt

Stephanie Hurt lives in Georgia with her husband Tommy and their son Hunter, along with two dogs, Daisy and Jake. When Stephanie is not lost in one of the worlds that she creates, she's an accountant and children's minister. She has been writing the stories that fill her mind since she was a teenager. The moment a story comes into her mind, she's mesmerized and soon she's diving into the story with a cup of hot green tea and a notebook. Before long, the story has bones and is ready for the laptop. She happily types away in the early morning and at night. You can always find her with a notebook full of stories that have yet to come to life. Follow her journey in each of her over 40 published works! Stephanie Payne Hurt loves to hear from fans and hopes that she's helped them go to another world for at least a while! Connect with Author: Twitter: https://twitter.com/StephanieHurt4 Email: https://stephaniehurt4@gmail.com Website: www.stephaniehurtauthor.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/StephaniePayneHurt Sign up for my newsletter at www.stephaniehurtauthor.com to keep up with upcoming events and new releases.

How’s your writing attitude?

In life we show a lot of different attitudes. Bad or good is up to you. As a writer I’ve noticed a lot about my writing that goes along with my attitude. Here are a couple of things I’ve noticed.

When I’m in a really good mood and my attitude is peppy and upbeat I do a lot of writing. It seems to pump me up and get me going with ideas. When my mood is not so good I notice  that I’m not as into my writing as I need to be. When I’m in a thoughtful mood I can really put words on screen. It’s amazing how our attitude or mood can affect the writing we do.

I had a bad attitude not long ago, which is not usual for me. I usually have a good attitude, but that day I was just not a happy camper. I sat down with my laptop and re wrote the same line three times. Nothing sounded good and I almost gave in to the bad attitude. Then I noticed the list of my works in progress and one of the titles caught my eye. I opened the file and read the couple of paragraphs that had been hastily written a couple of months ago. Something in my attitude slipped. My mind suddenly went to a new plateau. 

The point I’m trying to get at is this. In my little world, sometimes my writing can bring me out of the bad attitude or help to conquer a low attitude. It’s like therapy in a laptop or story.  Usually it takes a new manuscript. Especially if I’ve been at a loss on another manuscript that I’ve been steadily working on. Just going into something new and fresh helps. So next time you are stuck in a bad or low attitude try opening a newer manuscript and refreshing your mind. It could help out and you may even finish the new one.

So as always good writing and May God Bless You…

When the bloom makes way for the leaf

As most of you know, I’m an accountant. This is my busy time of the year with tax season in full swing. My office is beside my house which is great. I have a flower bed nestled among the trees in front of the office. The big draw to the flower bed is a forsythia bush or yellow bell to most. I raised it from a cutting that my grandmother gave me of hers back when we first moved in our new home around 19 years ago. The bush has been in her yard for more years than she could count. 

When I look at this bush I think of her. She’s been in Heaven for over 12 years but every year when the bush blooms I think of her. I think of the precious heirloom in it’s full beauty.

As I watched the bush flowing lightly in the breeze yesterday I marveled at the tiny yellow blooms that were still hanging on among the vibrant green leaves. It made me smile as I thought about how this process is similar to writing.

You may be saying what? Think about it. As writers we start with the bare limbs, then as the bud of a story blooms forth we get the story started. Then comes the full bloom of the work, the beauty. But the final is the nurtured green leaf that is the finished product, which holds on. But a lot of the time the bloom holds on for dear life, not letting us get to the finished product completed until it’s the right time.

As always good writing and May God Bless You…

Good Memory and Writing…

Do you have a good memory? Me, not hardly 🙂 Sometimes I really think I’m losing my memory skills. Our memory is an integral part of writing. Why? Well here are my top 5 reasons memory is important to writers:

1: You have to remember the main characters biography. If you have a woman with blonde hair for the main character and all of a sudden in the middle of the book you write they have dark hair, well you’ve just lost the character all together. I’ve actually read a book before that the main character changed all together. It’s a story breaker!

2: Book Setting – This is important to the story. If you’re story is based in the snowy mountains, then midway through the book it becomes the desert, then you’ve lost the objective completely. 

3: Character backgrounds – When you start a book always keep a notebook beside you as you write. As you develop a character write down their characteristics. Keep up with amount of siblings, hometown, etc.

4: Love background – You may have to ask yourself what I mean. Well it’s quite simply this, if your main couple has a history, then keep it straight. Make sure that  if they’ve been in a relationship before the book starts, then don’t make it sound like first love. Let the past lead you to the present.

5: Don’t forget the main objective of your book. Don’t let it stray far off the mark without a good reason or sub plot.

This is just my opinion and the way I write. It may not work for you, but it helps me to keep things straight.

As always, good writing and May God Bless You…

Clearing the Monday morning fog.

Have you ever woke up on Monday morning and felt like you were in a fog. It’s like Monday’s are just destined to be a groggy day. I don’t know why that is because I actually rested yesterday and even took a small nap, which was food induced 🙂 By that I mean that I ate way too much for Easter dinner and was almost comatose by the time I got home from dinner with family.

As I start my work week I sit down to organize my week. Like I’m going to stay with that plan, but at least I try. I hope to get some writing in this week. Tax season has been really rough this year, but hopefully my tax program is back to almost normal. It’s still really slow, but it doesn’t lock up on me as much. 

Wishing everyone a great week and get inspired!

As always, great writing and May God Bless You…

Today’s a special day…

For me today has several meanings. Of course it goes without saying, but I’ll say it anyway, today we celebrate our Risen Savior. It’s an awesome day for a Christian. 

It’s also a special day for me as a mother. Today my handsome son turned 14. It’s so hard to believe he’s 14. I’m so proud of him. He’s a good young man and makes me smile everyday. When I look at him I see a miracle. He was a twin, but I lost his twin during the pregnancy and the doctor wasn’t sure he’d make it. It was a miracle that he did. I call him my miracle baby. He withstood all the obstacles and survived. Some ask if he’s spoiled and I proudly say “You bet he is”. 

Hope everyone spent time with their families today and enjoyed this beautiful Easter Day. 

As always, good writing and May God Bless You…

Formal writing, What’s your style?

I’ve been told that some of my books are written a little too formally. I usually laugh because I’m a very southern speaking girl. For those that are not familiar with the Southern speech, usually I have clients that are not from here that call just to hear me speak. I laugh and tell them to get a life. So when someone says I write formally I have to laugh.

As for my writing, I don’t feel like it’s that formal. Sometimes I use ‘I could not’ instead of ‘I couldn’t’ but when I look back at it, that’s the only way it sounds right. I hear a lot of writers that send their work to editors and when it comes back certain parts no longer sound right. Well not right in the sense of the feel it originally had. You have certain ways you speak that gets points across and the wording is crucial. When you change even one word whether formal or not it changes the feel.

In my first couple of books I was so careful to use good English, but as I published more books I leaned more toward the down to earth style. When I relaxed a little, the reviews went from ‘written a tad formal’ to actually talking about the book.

So what’s your style? Do you watch your couldn’t and shouldn’t or do you just write from the seat of your pants and throw the English book out the door? I think that’s when you get through to the reader. You can even throw in some ‘yeah’s’ and ‘ain’t’. I know ain’t is not a word, but in the south it’s part of our vocabulary 🙂

As always, good writing and May God Bless You…

Does your cover reveal too much?

As with any writer I always struggle with my cover design. Sometimes I’ve got a picture in my mind of how I want the cover to look. During the writing of my books I’m constantly thinking of the cover. Some parts of the book inspire the cover.

It’s so discouraging to pick up a book and look at the cover expecting one thing and reading the book to find something totally different. I’ve done this several times as I know you have too. For example, the book has a vampire on the cover and the only thing about vampires in the book is a short part from a nightmare with a character. So why put a vampire on the cover when the book is not about vampires at all but about something totally different.

Then you get into the aspect of revealing too much with the cover. Let’s say that in the book there is a secret that will not be revealed until the middle or end of the book. You don’t want to put something about that on the cover if it will tell the reader what the secret is. This just spoils the whole suspense plot. 

So in my opinion the cover has to be thought over quite a bit. The cover can reveal a lot about the book. When my assistant and I designed the first couple of covers it was so wrong. We quickly revised it until we were happy. I was careful not to reveal too much about the plot but I also made sure the cover was relevant. 

Hope this helps if you’re working on your cover. It’s often one of the hardest things to me as a writer other than the dreaded description, but that’s a whole new blog post 🙂

As always, good writing and May God Bless You…