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Warning to Writers. Warning…Warning!! By Christine
Lindsay
If you
want to write fiction you have to adjust to the fact that all fiction is
autobiographical. You’re going to bleed emotionally on the pages. You will need
plenty of hankies near your computer.
When I
first started writing 15 years ago, I understood any non-fiction I hoped to
write, especially the book on my birth-mother experience, would be
autobiographical. But later when it seemed that particular true-life account
might never be published, I felt the Lord urge me to put the spiritual and
emotional truths I’d learned into Christian Fiction.
Whew! I thought. This means I don’t
have to bare my soul. I can hide behind my “untrue” historical epics with plenty
of action and romance that God-willing might help readers think about the Lord
while they’re being entertained.
Here’s the
true scoop.
When I
wrote Shadowed in Silk I don’t think
readers had a clue that I was plastering my heart and soul into my heroine Abby
Fraser, into my bad-guy Russian spy, and especially into Abby’s enemy the
Muslim woman Tikah who kidnaps Abby’s child.
The title
Shadowed in Silk shows all characters
feel invisible for their own reasons. The two women feel no one sees their
heartaches or hears their cries in the night. As a woman who was hurting over
the relinquishment of my firstborn to adoption, I felt like invisible Abby. I
also felt like my Russian spy who chooses to be invisible on purpose. But I
also felt like Tikah who steals Abby’s little boy, because part of my heart
longed to turn the clock back so that I’d never relinquished my child in the
first place. I took the bare truth of my soul and painted that longing into my
character Tikah as she does the reprehensible.
Shocking,
I know. I’m not saying my emotions were right or honorable. Emotions are
emotions, but that’s what books are, a baring of the soul. Of course I didn’t
take back my true-life child, and the Lord helped me through my heartache.
Thankfully,
God didn’t leave me in my spiritual immaturity, and my second book Captured by Moonlight shows some of that
spiritual growth.
One of
my heroines, the beautiful Indian woman Eshana is living her Christian life,
energized as she does the work she believes God has laid out for her. But then,
her fanatical Hindu uncle pops out of the past and kidnaps her. He imprisons
her in a ruined jungle palace, has her head shaved, her lovely saris taken
away, and dressed in course white cotton like that of a Hindu widow. Though
Eshana has been abandoned, the work she loves seemingly taken from her, she
says the following, straight from my heart from my true life, “I will sing your praises, Lord. Though
you have dressed me in funeral clothes, I will sing your praises with joy.”
I could
go on and on—how Veiled at Midnight shows
what I learned the 2 years my brother lived with my husband and me, as my
brother went through rehab for his alcoholism. This book breathes the message
that nothing, absolutely nothing, can separate us from the love of God.
The
message of Londonderry Dreaming is to
speak the truth in love, no matter how hard it hurts. And in the
soon-to-be-released Sofi’s Bridge is about
being true to the gifts God has placed in our souls. All deep spiritual and
emotional lessons that I have learned in my true life.
God has
done some amazing things for me. Sure, I’ve suffered, who doesn’t, but I’ve experienced that
scintillating feeling when God makes everything new. That’s why I always write
happy endings.
That’s also
why 15 years since I first starting writing, I’m seeing my original dream come
to pass. Remember that non-fiction book on my birth-mother experience that
started it all? Well, it too is soon-to-be-released. But in all honesty, there
is just as much of me in my fictional novels as there is in this account.
Christine's Ah-hahs To Tweet:
Author
Christine Lindsay @CLindsayWriter has a warning for writers! (Tweet This)
Everyone’s
Story: Christine Lindsay @CLindsayWriter tells true scoop on her award-winning
fiction (Tweet This)
Christine
Lindsay @CLindsayWriter: What’s the 1 thing #writers & #readers need to
hold onto? (Tweet This)
Authors' Bio:
Christine Lindsay was born in Ireland, and is proud of the fact that she was once patted on the head by Prince Philip when she was a baby. Her great grandfather, and her grandfather—yes father and son—were both riveters on the building of the Titanic. Tongue in cheek, Christine states that as a family they accept no responsibility for the sinking of that infamous ship.
Christine Lindsay was born in Ireland, and is proud of the fact that she was once patted on the head by Prince Philip when she was a baby. Her great grandfather, and her grandfather—yes father and son—were both riveters on the building of the Titanic. Tongue in cheek, Christine states that as a family they accept no responsibility for the sinking of that infamous ship.
Stories
of Christine’s ancestors who served in the British Cavalry in Colonial India
inspired her multi-award-winning, historical series Twilight of the British
Raj, Book 1 Shadowed in Silk, Book 2 Captured by Moonlight, and
newly released Veiled at Midnight. Christine has two new books coming out this year—Sofi’s Bridge,
and the non-fiction story of her birth-mother experience, title still to come.
Places to connect with Christine:
