I had a great experience at the Write Here in Ephraim authors conference last weekend. They had “boot camp” on Friday, and we each brought 10 pages of something we had written. We took turns reading our stuff and then all the authors in the circle would comment and critique one another’s work. Here’s what multiple-book-author Kathryn Elizabeth Jones said about my blog posts Introduction and Even Rocks Have Rights: “Jackson has a way with words. He took the difficult subject of church and state and made it accessible – especially to folks who may not usually delve into that. He has a conversational way of writing; his placement of stories is genius, like the cave represented in the introduction. It’s as if the cave is lit up for the very first time and the answers are clear.”

On Monday, while I was going over my notes from the conference, I discovered that I could create an author’s page on Amazon. Then, while doing that I discovered that a couple copies of my book A New Message are for sale there for $18.

So it’s been a very rewarding week for me. Writing a book, I’ve discovered, is a lot like climbing a mountain for the first time. You have to find your way, and there are cold nights and magnificent vistas.