Lenora Worth's Blog

I am not an organized person. I’m semi-organized. That means I put things in a safe place where I will remember them, and the promptly forget where I put them. If I backtrack and use skills that could work for a crime-scene investigation, I usually find notes, or my keys, or my wallet, or maybe the candy I hid, or that one pair of socks that have disappeared.

In pondering how to improve my lack of organization skills, I refrained from ordering anymore how-to books since I can’t find the ones I have. And besides, they give me the hives. Maybe I’m a closet hoarder, or a soft hoarder, meaning I keep things but they are all so useful. Right.

Anyway, I have come up with a new way of being kind of organized. I call it smorganized. Yes, it’s a smorgasbord full of wonder, and it’s all there somewhere but it’s disarray spilling out in an almost pretty, creative kind of chaos. That book I just read—it’s in there with two bookmarks tagging along. My flip flops are next to the book, one flipping and one flopping. And my beach scarves, all dozen of them, are tossed out like wilted flowers waiting for a vase. That nail polish I searched for three days ago when I needed it is sitting there prim and upright in a pretty flamingo pink. A note I scribbled about my plot for the book that is due two days from now, looks like a two-year-old tried to draw a maze. My closet is super-smorganized. Clothes on two long racks, with various purses that remind me of a quilt that never got finished, shoe boxes that all have a story to tell, and comfy clothes that I wear over and over, while I neglect my pretty dresses and fancy boots and jeans. Tee-shirts that I love, while I ignore my colorful field of sweaters and my over-abundant need for hoodies of all colors. It’s a hot mess that has somehow grown into a garden that needs to be pruned desperately.

And my office? —It is Smorganized Central, with my beloved spiral notebooks, my half-a-million ink pens and small notepads, my whitewashed pages of workshop handouts, and leftover plots turned to dust. And books all around, like a fortress of lost trees that became words with friends and now protects me from myself and the world when I just can’t take it all anymore. There is comfort in stuff—it’s yours, it’s personal, it holds memories and pain, and it’s a blanket of both protection and rejection that somehow works if you can find a maze through it. So I am smorganized in my own way and that’s just fine with me. Oh, my, I just looked over and found an exercise bike. Where did that come from and who in this house uses it???

I am organized enough to remind everyone that I have a book out right now. (Good people who keep me on track helped me with that one.) You can find it online and in certain highly organized bookstores. Just don’t ask me where I put my author copies.

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I don’t blog as often as I’d like but I hope to change that in 2025. I’m changing a lot of things in the coming year. I’ve been a published writer for thirty-one years and I’ve mostly loved every minute of my career. I love writing stories that entertain, encourage, and enlighten readers. But last year, I hit a wall. Or more like I hit a hole in the wall. I didn’t get writer’s block because I still have so many ideas for books I want to write. I think I hit writer’s lock–where I literally stopped in mid-sentence and thought something has to change. I’m a doer. I take on things and some I’m good at, some not so much. I like to help, I like to contribute, but when we moved to Florida over a decade again, I decided I’d just write. All day, all the time. I became content with having back-to-back deadlines and one or two day vacations. I buried my troubles in my stories which helped make them all the more real. This worked most of the time, but in that one moment when things shifted, I realized I needed to stop and think things through, make a few changes, try some new adventures in writing before I just gave up and retired. We had a house near the Gulf of Mexico, but during Covid, we bought a small fixer-upper house on a beautiful inland lake. But the yard looked like a jungle. I fell in love with the quirkiness of the lake house and after a couple of years of going back and forth from the big house to the lake house, we decided to move to the lake.

So this year, we’ve been unpacking and renovating and I’ve been writing, but things seem different now. The pace here is slower, the neighbors are friendly, and life is just more simple. I’ve finished all my contracted books and took a couple of months off, but the road is wide open now. Which fork will I take? I haven’t decided yet, but I do know I’m not getting any younger! As Jimmy Buffet sang, “I have boats to build.” I have books to write and maybe I’ll get them all down on the page even if my pace is slower and my choices are different. I have books to write and I have this spot, this blog, to come to when I need to talk to all of you. There are ebbs and flows in the ocean and the lake. There are ebbs and flows in life, too. Right now, I’m drifting and enjoying my surroundings. I’ve had a wonderful career with several publishing companies and I’ve had a lovely time getting to know my readers, too. So I’m not bitter or resentful. I’m content and thankful, and it feels strange to be so still and not on a deadline. But..and this is a big but…yesterday on a sunny Sunday afternoon, I opened up a story I’d started a year or so ago and started writing again. For myself, for my sense of discipline–something every writer needs–for that urge to make up a story and find out how it will end–also something every writer needs. Going throught this writer’s lock, or the hole-in-the-wall full stop, got me wondering if other people, not matter their careers, suddenly look up and realize something has to change. Has this ever happened to you?

Meantime, I do have a book coming out next summer and a novella next Christmas. So don’t write me off just yet! I’ll be seeing you in all the old familiar places….Happy New Year!

Group Hug….

It’s been a while. My life changed this year in a big way. We moved (again). This time we moved from our home near the Gulf of Mexico (and I say near because we lived inland about eight miles) to a lake about an hour from the Gulf. The fixer-upper lake house we bought during the pandemic needs some TLC but we’re getting there. I didn’t think I’d ever move back to a small country town, but here I am back in the land of bugs, spiders, snakes, and lots of trees everywhere. It’s quaint and the floors squeak and I squeak each time a strange bug follows me into the house. But the views of the water and the sunrise and sunset are amazing. Many of you might know this because I share the sunsets around here a lot. They are too beautiful to not share!! Such as right now!

Today, however, I want to ask the world for a group hug. I love my home, my town (all the towns I’ve lived in) and my country. I love my friends, family, readers and the world in general. We have scary things happening–wars, fighting, anger, many opinions on many things, storms that have changed lives forever. So could we just take a breath and remember the good things about America. America has always been great to me. I grew up on a farm and we lived off the land. We weren’t rich but we weren’t poor either. We just did what we had to do to survive. My mama made my clothes or we ordered them from the Sears and Roebuck catalog. But with all the troubles, I had a fairly good life and the isolation of living on a farm is what caused me to turn to reading, where I could go anywhere in my imagination. That led to me realizing I had to be a writer. Not just wanted to, but had to, write books. So here we are and some of my authors friends in the states that were hit hard by Helene and her wrath, are suffering. We can pray for them and the many people who have lost homes and family and for now, their livelihoods. We can send funding and later, material things, to help them. We all know how this works. This country can pull together even when we seem divided, right?

I know this because when my husband was taking me to the airport in the wee hours of Friday, September 27th, we were on a long isolated country road that belongs to the air force base near our home. No one else was on the road at four a.m. Then we saw a row of lights shining as big trucks came rolling along toward us in the other lane. White utility trucks, staged and ready, moved through the darkness like giant angels. There must have been at least two dozen of these trucks passing us in the night. I can’t tell you how proud this made me. Men and women getting a call, loading their GO packs and heading out away from their families and toward the crisis. This is what America is to me. This is what makes our country great–always. I’m not talking politics. That subject is not allowed on this blog. I’m talking humanity and love and helping a neighbor even if that neighbor is hundreds or thousands of miles away. That’s all I’m saying. Storms, wars, troubles, worries, fear, disagreements, changes, life–these things will always be with us. But a big group hug right now, no matter, can help all of us. Positive attitudes are always more intiutive than negative vibes that just bring us all down. Hug someone. Smile at someone. Listen to someone. And try watching a sunrise or a sunset. Feel that bit of peace and think of those who are suffering more than us right now.

Okay, I’m done. I’m sending y’all a big GROUP HUG! Send me on back, will you?

The holidays are a haze of what I call grazing days. Grazing days involve parties, Christmas open house get-togethers, church celebrations, and family meals that spread across two or three tables next to a mountain of aluminum foil tossed on the corner counter. And the one most important thing about grazing days is cheese. Yes, ma’am. Cheese.

Different sorts of cheese on kitchen table.

Think about it. Statics say over the last twelve weeks of 2023, the USA spent about 323 million dollars on cream cheese! That’s a lot of cheesecake and dip, my darlings! Wisconsin, the Cheese State, sold about 3.5 billion pounds of cheese in 2022. That means we each eat about forty pounds of cheese each year, give or take a slice here and there.

It’s tough because each recipe calls for some type of cheese. Dip cheese, cake cheese, cookie cheese, pizza cheese, sliced cheese that goes with crackers, olives, fruits, vegetables, and select beverages all crammed onto a huge board that EVERYONE TOUCHES. Is that cheesy or what? That, my friend, is the essence of GRAZING DAYS!

But wait? The SUPERBOWL is next. They call it that because of the big bowls of CHEESE we must consume on this day. Hello, queso and Rotel, lots of Rotel and other spicy additives. And chips, gotta have chips!

The Grazing Days continue with Valentine’s Day–Chocolate Cheesecake, please, and Mardi Gras–throw me some cheese, Mister! And cream-cheese-and-strawberry King Cake! Then we move on to St Patrick’s Day and Easter and Memorial Day and another big cheese day–the Fourth of July. Fireworks and cheese! Labor Day pairs well with cheese, too, don’t you think? And then we’re back to the original Holidays. And macaroni-and-cheese–always! Whew. That went by like a Cheeto being thrown at your mean brother, didn’t it?

All of this to say, I hope you had some great Grazing Days and I hope this new year brings you lots of Grazing opportunities, because most of us love our cheeses. Right now, I’m going to nibble on some fresh mozzarella with crackers and celery–just to get some green in there–and some gruyere with fruit. (And I can’t even pronounce that one!) I do know that young gruyere is smooth and nutty and older gruyere is more earthy and salty. Which describes me at times, too. And don’t get me started on wine and cheese. That’s a whole different subject, but it does require an elegant sort of grazing, where you have to sniff things and pretend you know all about tannins in wine and you tell people you flew to Pier 39 in San Francisco to handpick your cheeses. We’re still on Grazing 101 here, people. We buy our cheeses at that famous Superstore with the WM initials. But we can be classy when we want to, right? I mean, Velveeta sounds so velvet…

Maybe next time, I’ll talk about chocolate…..Happy New Year!

(Oh, and you can read while you nibble some cheese, please! I need Cheesecake money!) What’s your favorite cheese recipe?

It’s been a while. I’m going to do better at chatting with my few followers, and maybe get more followers! Bear with me. This was the long hot summer, right? So fall leaves and cool air are welcome changes. Speaking of changes, have you ever had a moment where you felt a change coming? I’m having one of those moments. But change is good in life and each time I’ve gone through some sort of change–work, moving across the country, a death in the family, a birth in the family, or even a new hairdo, I’ve always found a way to make it work. To accept it and move on and go with the flow. Life is about changes and growth and a continuing maturity and learning things as we move along the path.

Because the flow is alway going to go and we might as well accept that. Meantime, I have been writing and getting ready to move to a fixer-upper lake house that is half the size of our house now. But it has charm and character and old magnolia trees and gardenia bushes. I told my husband it was like falling into a Tennesse Williams story. I could smell the South in that jungle of a yard. My husband has been slowly renovating the house and soon it should be all finished. Probably in about twenty years or so!!

Do you have a change coming in your life? If so, I hope they are good changes.

With fall comes new releases for Lenora Worth. We offer a Louisiana story, because I lived there for most of my adult life until we moved to Florida, and two Amish stories that are slightly connected. If you haven’t read my Amis series set at the Shadow Lake Inn near Lake Erie (a place I made up and used a lot of poetic license creating, I hope you’ll consider The Memory Quilt, The Forgving Quilt, and the last story in the series, The Christmas Quilt. Amish Christmas Kinner features a novella that takes place at the Shadow Lake Inn during Christmas. Here are the covers:

I love these covers and I love being able to write in several different genres. I’m never bored with my writing. You can find a preview of The Christmas Quilt here:

Thanks for following my blog and thanks for reading my books! Have a happy fall, y’all!

You’re been thinking about writing sweet or inspirational fiction for a long time.You’d love to have the fabulous Deb Raney be your mentor for two months.You have a need to tell stories that reflect your beliefs and your sweetness.You read a lot of romance, romantic suspense, and historical fiction. So why not write it?Elnora says do it!

The deadline to enter is August 1, 2023. Yes, that’s about three weeks from now. But what if? What if you pull out that proposal and dust it off. Make it pretty. Then you read and edit the three chapters you’d like to send to an editor or agent one day. You might not win this contest, but you’ll get feedback that will set you on the road to publication. You can’t eat a cupcake until you’d tested the recipe, right? Tweak it, make it your own, then put the icing on top and sprinkle it with love. You can do this. (If I can do this, anyone can, I know.)

“We are all apprentices in a craft where no one ever becomes a master.”–Ernest Hemingway, Writer’s Digest

“Write. Rewrite. When not writing or rewriting, read. I know of no shortcuts.–Larry L. King, Writer’s Digest

“Plot is people. Human emotions and desires founded on the realities of life, working at cross purposes, getting hotter and fiercer as they strike against each other until there’s an explosion–that’s Plot.”–Leigh Brackett, Writer’s Digest

(All quotes from Writer’s Digest “72 of the Best Quotes about Writing.” Zachary Petit, June 22, 2012)

What are you waiting for? Tell your story. You have to start somewhere! Let me know if you entered!!!

So March has blown through and now we are into April, but I’m still going to give away more books. I had a great time at the Blue Lake Christians Writers Conference in the wilds of Alabama. I’m kind of high maintenance and this is a conference center and camp center. Dorm-type rooms and a charm that captures you in spite of the old showers and … uh … no room service. The first time I went, I was terrified. I’d been going through some personal stuff and I just needed a retreat. God knew this. It happened in a God way. A friend had loaned me a library book. He loved to read Florida-set stories and so did I. Only I forgot I had the book. He got fined and gently let me know to return it. When I got there, the library manager knew I wrote Christian fiction and told me about Blue Lake. It was scheduled for the next week. I went home and registered, getting in at the last minute. I didn’t want to go as a writer. I wanted to go as a woman who needed a spiritual retreat. It was hard to explain, but I wound up there in a deep mood and left scared to ever return because I got so emotional and overwhelmed. When people found out I’d written a lot of books, and mostly for Love Inspired, I got popular really quickly I’d go to my room and write when I couldn’t sleep in the middle of the night. After it was over, I told my husband I might not go back. It was so different and I didn’t know a lot of the people. But I did go back and now I’m friends with all those people. I’ve given workshops there several times. I tell people Blue Lake saved me. It did. So even without room service, I survived and it has become a special place in my heart. If you have a writing dream, start somewhere small like Blue Lake and see how it will change your life. Watch for it next year. Here is the link:

bluelakecwr.com

The chapel

The view from my room at Blue Lake.

Now back to giving away books! I’ve so enjoyed this and it’ s helped me go down memory lane and think about all the good times I’ve had in this career. I’m slowing down a bit, but I’ll always have another story in my head.

Here are the winners from last week: Jane Squire, Mary Ann Draper, Rita Middleton, Betty Mace, and Carlita Walker. I will PM all of you for mailing info!

I’m catching up to the last few days of March, so I’ll have one more post on this month long celebration. I don’t go on and on to brag, but to show people that if we set goals and work toward those goals, despite the world and the voices shouting doubts into our heads, we can accomplish what we set out to accomplish. Dream big but set small goals–and you can have a career–work that works for you! (No matter what career you dream of having.) PS–this book is out now!! Yay!!!

So, a month is a long time. And wouldn’t you know the more I get into March, the more busy I get! But we have books to giveaway. So leave a comment and you might get a book! To recap, I’m going to list the names I’ve picked so far. If you see you name, email me through my website or PM me on FB and I’ll get your mailing preferences.

And remember, you will get a book. I have a big mailout at the end of the week! If you have received yours, just ignore your name below.

Mary GarnerCheryl VernonSue HollandTina HughesBarbara Bailey WolfordJackie TatumRoxanne CruzSally Jo PittsDenise Stout HolcombPatty Jo MooreTammie Edington ShawLinda StringerKati Kolodziejczak DribanMelissa StandSara TaylorDeana Dick

This is only half of the list! I’m headed to do a workshop at a conference this weekend, so I’ll go through and pick the next winners when I get home. Again, thanks to all of you for commenting!

Now, back to the day I found out one of my books had made the NY Times Bestseller List. I was in my PJs about to clean house for a Cabi party that night. (Clothes–and the rep brings them to your house for you and your friends to try on!!) First, my phone started ringing. Then my email starting filling up. I thought what is going on? One of the editors from LI called me to tell me my continuity book “Body of Evidence” had made the list! I was so shocked I had to sit down. Then I got flowers from my agent and chocolate from my editor. The delivery woman finally asked if I was sick (because no makeup and old PJs. ) I said no and explained. She was as excited as me. And I had lovely flowers to display at my party. Where I bought a lot of jeans and sweaters!!!) It was so much fun!

These are the next dates: March 21, 22, 23, 24, 25. I’ll update next week! And these are the next books:

So I took the weekend to write and do edits. This is a writer’s life. We kind of live with our characters twenty-four seven. I didn’t get much done. We have a puppy named Bogi and we’ve had him a week. I’m sleepy, hungry, and having a ball. It reminds me of newborns and all the attention they need. He’s a little bundle of energy and is still learning where he should go to the bathroom. He loves sitting by my feet when I work. And yes, that’s a lid behind him. He found it and tries to attack it. He is a tiny plaything. Distracting, yes!

But we have things to do. We are on the downhill run with going down memory lane with Elnora. So in 1995, I sold two books on my birthday. One more to Avalon and one to Leisure. We celebrated at Cracker Barrel and I bought a sunflower throw to mark the occasion. I still have that throw. In 1996, my then agent told me about Love Inspired, a new inspirational line coming from Harlequin. She got me the last editor appointment available at a conference in Texas. I had an idea I’d wanted to write, so I typed up a couple of paragraphs. I was so scared when I went in to pitch, the editor took the paper from my shaking hands and read the blurb. She told me to send her the synopsis and three chapters. I did and they bought the book. That was The Wedding Quilt. My first book for Love Inspired. I couldn’t believe it had happened. I thought after the new editor at Leisure turned down my next book, I’d never sell another manuscript. But God knew. The timing, the pitch, the idea, the story in my head–it all worked out. My book came out in December of 1997, one of the very last of the launch books. I started with one book proposals and sometimes sold from just a paragraph. Then I moved to three book contracts, and several series books that involved families and a love story in each book. Now most of us at LI get multi-book contracts. Because LI builds your career as you go.

I’m not wealthy, but I have made a fair living at this for all these years. Over the last fifteen years, I’ve stay busy because I had a lot of people reaching out to me to write with them or for them. Steady work and challenging at times. But I’m still at it. I’ll never stop writing, but I’m going to slow down a bit…one day! But that’s another story for another time. Next, I’ll tell you about the day I made the NY Times Bestseller list. A favorite memory of mine!

Meantime, I have a lot of books to give away:

Secret Agent Minister goes to Deana Dick

Assignment: Body Guard goes to Sally Jo Pitts.

Lone Star Protector goes to Linda Stringer

Ladies, please PM or email me through my website with your mailing addresses!

Today, I’m giving away these three for days 18, 19, and 20.

Until next time, here’s a summery photo to remind you that dreams do come true. A dream is something you want. A goal is something you need to make that dream a reality. You have to be proactive in your goals, and hopeful in your dreams. That’s how life works.