On May 9th, 1980, I accepted Christ as my Savior. My life has never been the same since. In fact, I would have never made it through all of the devastating things I’ve endured if it hadn’t been for Jesus. I love Him so much. Jesus…You rock! And let me tell you, my Heavenly Father has a sense of humor. He took a woman who hated English and reading and turned her into a novelist. My debut novel, The Bride Wore Coveralls, is now available through Heartsong Presents. The sequel, Déjà vu Bride, which is about monster trucks, is available through Spirit Light Books. I’m also working on its sequel titled Powder Puff Bride. It sports funny cars, dragsters, demolition derbies, mud-bog racing, figure eight racing, and monster trucks.
I’m also working on my first historical, You Ordered What, and have twenty-eight other stories started. I have several short-short stories published in Rough Writers Ink magazine.
For as long as I can remember I’ve loved hot rods. And the louder… the better. Figure eight racing—smokin’ hot! The thrill of all those classic cars racing around the track and coming together in the middle sends chills up my spine and goose bumps on top of my goose bumps. My first car was a maroon 1955 Chevy. I was so proud of that piece of junk—er—hunk of metal. Hey, what can I say, it was my first car and I bought it for $100.00. My second and favorite car was a Rally Green, 1968 Nova that sported Keystone wheels and spinners, Gabriel highjackers, spacers on the front, and a positraction rear-end, which came in handy for squealing and peeling around the corners and taking off at stop signs. My third classic car was a pastel yellow ’68 Firebird that gobbled up gas with its 400, 4-barrel that opened up at 85. How do I know it opened up at 85 miles-per-hour? I’ll never tell. hehe
If only I’d kept them all. If I could, I would own almost every classic car ever made. But, I’m not just about race cars, muscle cars, mud bog racers, and monster trucks. At one time I was a barrel racer—as in horses/rodeo. That’s how I met my husband of thirty-four years—at a rodeo dance.
The first cow/calf ranch we lived on was… are you ready for this…fifty-eight miles, one way, from the nearest store. So, if I wanted a loaf of bread, I drove 116 miles round trip to get it. At that time, I had a one-year-old baby, no phone, lived three miles off the main ranch, and loved it. Now, I’d shoot my husband with a potato gun for even thinking about moving me to someplace like that. The next nineteen years were spent on cow/calf ranches, and the last seven were on a ranch where people bought parcels of land. One of them included a famous movie star and her screenwriter husband, who I didn’t even know about until someone told me they’d read about it in the newspaper. To think that all that time a movie star was there and I didn’t even know it. WOW. Probably a good thing I didn’t know. I mean really… a screenwriter that close to me and I didn’t even get to pick his brain. Now that’s unfair. hehe Oh well. Life goes on.
Recently my husband and I moved from a small mountain town, where we lived for over twenty years, to a large city. Talk about cultural whiplash. Woooo Weeee! I’m still recovering. So now I’m enjoying creating stories and getting to talk to my first batch of readers and looking forward to all the fun stories to come.
