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.

While I wasn’t writing…

Old Notebook Paper

What a wonderful day to write! It’s rainy and a little chilly. Yes, I’m back to writing and so glad.

But what happens to me when I don’t write… What happens when tax season takes all my time and leaves none for writing… Well here goes!

1: The characters in my head go nuts. Really… They go nuts. They run around screaming and yelling, constantly! Some days I wonder if I’ll lose my mind before I can write again.

2: The untold stories are filling the space around the crazy characters. Every moment of my day is filled with thoughts of where my characters can take their lives. I name characters while I depreciate assets. Yes, one character might turn up named Asset, just saying.

3: I wonder around feeling unwhole. Does that make sense? To writers, it should. As a writer, we fill the voids with our writing and when we can’t write, it just makes a hole.

4: I’m terminally stressed when I don’t write. Writing is my stress reliever… so what happens when I can’t write, well, my stress level goes up, up, up…

5: The most important thing that happens when I can’t write is I get behind and have to catch up.

Ok, so, you get the picture. Writing is my stress reliever and it helps keep me sane in this insane world. Maybe you don’t have this problem, but I do. As an Accountant, wife, mother, children’s minister, and writer, I need to keep the characters at bay or my mind will explode.

Yesterday was my first time to write over 500 words in over four weeks. It was as though my head cleared of the fog and I relaxed. My characters were walking around in my head, whistling and happy. It was a great day. Now, as I sit here, preparing to get in my daily word count, which sounds great… I’m smiling.

Just a little tidbit, I have a new series coming this summer and I’m uber excited. In the coming days and weeks, I’ll be revealing a few little things about it. But, you’ll have to be patient. Let’s just say it is big, real big, at least for me…

As always, great writing and May God Bless You…

P.S. Please help me get out of Twitter jail by going over to https://twitter.com/StephanieHurt4 and give me a follow. It’s hilarious that I finally get up to following 5000 and have over 4300 followers, but Twitter locks me down from following anyone until my followers go up. LOL! Yes, I just asked you to follow me on Twitter, I told you my mind has been compromised from lack of writing.

 

 

Friday’s Second Cup…

Good Friday morning! We’re finally almost to the weekend. My short vacation is almost over, but that’s alright since tax season is over with, I’ll have a little more time to relax. For now, I’m sipping my second cup of coffee, baking blueberry muffins and looking forward to my third cup of coffee…15357511258_cbf39f66bb

So, now that I’m back to a regular writing schedule, I’m back on my works in progress. I have four books in the works, two almost complete. Now to get back into the groove and push those words out.

It’s amazing when you take a short break from writing, the words still come in. My mind swirled with words constantly. It was hard not to sit down at my laptop and put them into my manuscripts, but time wasn’t there to do this.  Of course, as a writer, this was a difficult time. Especially with my characters screaming at me on a daily basis. But the characters have calmed some since I’m back to writing.

So, what is everyone working on? Me, I’m working on Lacey’s Choice, Highlander’s Son, Georgia and a new series, which I’ll let you in on a little later.

As always, good writing and May God Bless You…

Tuscany is Free today & tomorrow!

Tuscany is Free for two days! If you haven’t experienced the world of Tuscany, now’s your chance while it’s FREE!

Tuscany is a contemporary romance set in the hills of Tuscany’s olive groves. It’s filled with mystery, adventure, betrayal and a love that builds from Chapter one and follows loves Legacy.

Go on an adventure to another country in this romance that takes you to one of the most beautiful places on earth, Tuscany. The magical lure is found on every page of this book.

This book hit the Top 55 in  Harlequin’s SYTYCW15 contest. Then was picked up by the awesome publisher Solstice, which took it to an all new high.

Free Ad

As always, good writing and may God Bless You…

Moment to Reflect…

Good morning! It’s been a while, but tax season has been crazy. You know it’s been busy if I haven’t been able to write in a couple of weeks. Yeah, I know, that’s not good. I’ve missed it, but now I’m back in action…

So, how’s everyone doing? I’ve missed interacting with all of you. Now that I’m back, you’ll be overloaded with posts, books, and lots of promotions. So get ready… get set…. go…

To my first post, I go…

While I’ve been away, ‘A Light Upon My Heart’ became an Amazon bestseller. Yep, I did a little happy dance at my desk… Glad no one could see me. If you haven’t check out this one, then grab it while it’s only .99.

Naomi Harris is only 18 when she’s sent from Georgia to Montana to marry a stranger. Joseph Walsh is a wealthy, 30-year-old, ranch owner, but he’s lonely and in need of a Christian bride. Naomi’s poor home life doesn’t prepare her for life on a large ranch and Joseph’s not sure how to react to the innocent young woman that he brought across the country to be his bride. Many obstacles stand in their way as they strive to make their marriage work, but can they get past them? The worst one is the secret that Naomi keeps, it could destroy what they’ve worked to gain. She can’t go back home, ever…

The sale will only be for a limited time… so get it before it goes back up!

As always, good writing and May God Bless You…

 

Easter Sale!

For a limited time, my bestselling Christian Historical Romance, A Light Upon My Heart is on sale for only .99!

A Light Upon My HeartFront Cover https://www.amazon.com/Light-Upon-My-Heart-ebook/dp/B01DIEH8GI

 

Naomi Harris is only 18 when she’s sent from Georgia to Montana to marry a stranger. Joseph Walsh is a wealthy, 30-year-old, ranch owner, but he’s lonely and in need of a Christian bride. Naomi’s poor home life doesn’t prepare her for life on a large ranch and Joseph’s not sure how to react to the innocent young woman that he brought across the country to be his bride. Many obstacles stand in their way as they strive to make their marriage work, but can they get past them? The worst one is the secret that Naomi keeps, it could destroy what they’ve worked to gain. She can’t go back home, ever…

 

Tax season will be over on the 18th and then you’ll get an overload of me 😉 See all of you when I find my way out of the pile of returns… In four days!

As always, good writing and May God Bless You…

Thursday Thoughts…

Good morning! For some reason this morning I feel excited that something is about to happen with my writing. I felt this way just before I made it to the top 55 in Harlequin’s SYTYCW contest in 2015 and also right before I submitted Tuscany to Solstice. But I don’t know what it is this time.

You may be asking, Stephanie, do you have anything submitted to a publisher, and my answer would be no. I guess, but don’t know, it’s the feeling of a coming announcement or maybe the new series that I’m starting in a couple of months, which by the way is really, really exciting for me. I don’t know. It’s just this strange but delightful feeling that has me humming and singing, thank goodness I’m alone in the house at the moment 😉

So, how are you feeling today? Any news to share?

As always, good writing and May God Bless You…

P. S. If you haven’t joined my newsletter, then give it a whirl. I just hit send on my latest newsletter this morning. It’s easy to join and I don’t fill your inbox with needless chatter, just upcoming releases, and sales…  www.stephaniehurtauthor.com

 

 

 

From Tuscany & Beyond…

tuscany-001

https://read.amazon.com/kp/embed?asin=B01M0MIB72&preview=newtab&linkCode=kpe&ref_=cm_sw_r_kb_dp_yaM0yb322RCQ8

Good Wednesday morning! Sorry, it’s been a little while since my last post. As most of you know, I’m an accountant, so this is my busy busy busy season! Not to mention I have a couple of writing deadlines, yes, I’m a glutton for punishment.

With Tuscany, I stepped out and took a chance. This book pulled at me like no other. I could see it being destined to do well. First step, I entered it into the Harlequin ‘So You Think You Can Write’ contest, with fingers crossed and anything else that would cross. It made it to the Top 55 of over 950 books. Yes, I did a happy dance and screamed. Even though it didn’t get any further, I knew it could go the distance.

Then, I decided to pitch it to Solstice Publishing, hoping they’d see what I saw and within 48 hours I had a lovely email from the editor. I’d sold Tuscany to Solstice and they wanted it. As most of you know, I’ve published 30 books, but this is the only one with a publisher other than myself. I’ve loved everything about the experience and wouldn’t change a thing. Solstice took Tuscany to news heights.

My dream for Tuscany is to see it one day make it into the hands of Hallmark Channel, but what romance author doesn’t dream of that. So, for now, I’ll keep typing away and dreaming of the day that it happens…

As always, good writing and May God Bless You…

Inside a Series…

Series Article

Good morning! As you can tell from the picture above, I’m talking about Five Oaks Ranch, my bestselling series.

Have you written a series? If so, did you have a hard time keeping the stories straight? This series was a work in progress that kept me on my toes. The idea for the series came as we drove back from our Florida vacation a couple of years ago. The road signs were passing by and each one seemed to spur an idea. So, by the time I got home, I had a skeleton map drawn on my notepad. Since I get car sick easily, it was a horrible looking thing, but I had it in my head and heart.

Over the next couple of days, I put together the book names, the character sketches for the five main characters and ideas for how their stories would go together. This series was the most fun as they almost wrote themselves. Each book fed off the other and it was as though I wrote one long manuscript and cut it into five books. I know, there were six, but the Christmas book only came into my head toward the end of Luke.

Several people started writing to me that they wanted to know more about the parents. At first, I was like, but this is the story about the five children, hence the series name, Five Oaks Ranch. Then as I sat thinking about it, I came up with the idea for the Christmas story that would bring it all together. So, A Christmas to Remember was born. By the way, at the end of the Christmas book, I’ve put several of my own family recipes that have been passed down through the generations.

The family tree is introduced in the Christmas book. You’ll notice that some of the kids haven’t been born in any of the books, but I wanted to let my readers know that the characters went on to lead love-filled lives together.

So, have you started the Five Oaks Ranch series yet? Ridge is free! This book stayed in the top 100 of free books on Amazon for over a year, which made me giggle with excitement everytime I looked at the stats. And you’ll notice a pretty, shiny silver medallion on the cover of Ridge. He was honored with a five-star review from Reader’s Favorites! Here’s the link to the whole series if you’re in the market for a new series to read, but here’s a warning, you’ll fall in love with the Cauthen’s.

As always, good writing and May God Bless You…

Revisiting an old friend!

Lacey's Choice front cover

I had a dream last night…It was about this manuscript…I now know where it’s headed and can’t stop my fingers from typing. As bad as it sounds, this book should have been finished a couple of years ago, but something snapped inside of me and I couldn’t finish it. I lost the story in my head, but in my dream, it all came back.

If you haven’t read the first book in this series, then grab it first. By the way, it’s  on Amazon – https://www.amazon.com/Open-Heart-Alpine-Christmas-Romance-ebook/dp/B00GW6T6AQ I’ve had so many sweet letters about the first book and so many asking for the second. I’m sorry it took me so long to get it back going, but when you lose the focus, you have to step back, or it will be a complete mistake.

So, Lacey’s Choice will be coming soon!

As always, good writing and May God Bless You…