Looking out the Window: Celebrate with Jean Pike. It's Release Day for Her New Book, About the Little Things
A Warm Welcome to Jean Pike
Jean talks about Jesus' intervention in her life as well as His intervention in the life of the heroine in About the Little Things.
Miracles and Answered Prayer
Beautiful and restless, Rochelle Delany makes choices as a young woman that almost ruin her life. As the story opens, she seeks to escape the nightmare of her present by fleeing back to her past. But things have changed in the small town of Redford’s Crossing, and she wonders if a person can ever really go home again. She grew up going to church but because of choices she made and choices that were forced on her she has been away from God for a long time. There is a scene in which Rochelle’s past pays a visit to her present and she finds herself in a dire situation. She cries out to God, and God steps in in a most miraculous way.
I’ve seen too many miracles to ever doubt that Jesus is real. He answers prayer in his own way and time. but no prayer ever goes unheard. Sometimes we feel His answers are slow in coming, but sometimes He steps in so immediately and so dramatically there can be no doubt that it is His hand at work.
I wrote Rochelle’s experience with confidence because He also stepped in for me. At a car wash. On an ordinary day…
All I wanted to do was wash my car. A long winter had turned into a muddy spring and my car was getting embarrassing. I didn’t give it a second thought when the pickup-truck rolled into the car wash beside me. I was surprised no one else was there on such a beautiful day, so another dirty vehicle in the lot didn’t seem out of the ordinary at all. Except the man in the truck didn’t seem to be taking care of business. He wasn’t washing or rinsing or even so much as tossing out a bag of trash. He was just sitting there, watching me vacuum.
Strange, I thought. Then I remembered a news story about a woman who’d been robbed and assaulted at a car wash in another town. I glanced nervously at my purse, sprawled open on the passenger seat across from me. Could something like that happen here, in our small town?
I realized how vulnerable I was. The car wash sat well back from the busy main street. If something happened, no one would see a thing. My heart pounded and I started to feel lightheaded. The vacuum timed out, but still I crouched there, clutching the hose. An old hymn popped into my head about God’s eye being on the sparrow and I took comfort in knowing the man’s eyes were not the only ones watching me.
He got out of his truck. I started to pray.
God, I know you see me. Maybe I’m being silly, but this man is scaring me. If he means me any harm, please… please make him go away.
The prayer had barely left my lips when a third car pulled into the car wash. Not just any random car. A city police patrol car. I was lightheaded again but this time with relief. As the officer got out of his car, the man got back in his pickup. And as the officer fed a dollar bill into the coin changer, the pickup truck pulled through the wash bay and drove out of the lot. I stared after him, utterly amazed.
Had the man meant me any harm? I’ll probably never know. All I know is that at that moment I had never felt more protected, never more loved.
James said that prayers must be asked in faith without doubting (James 1:6) and Jesus Himself said that faith the size of a mustard seed will move a mountain (Matthew 17:20, 21). I can’t think of a more pure or honest prayer than the one cried out in desperation. And though I don’t need dramatically answered prayer to know that Jesus is real, I’m glad He chooses to answer that way sometimes. It fills me with thankfulness. It reminds me of what an awesome God we have.
More about About The Little Things
A decade ago, Rochelle Delany made a decision that changed her life forever.
Wanting more than just football games and potluck suppers, she boarded a bus for California and didn't look back. But instead of a glamorous life, she became trapped in a nightmare of labor trafficking. Now, she's made a daring escape and returns home to Ohio.
Sandy Fairbrother has a problem with trust.
Twice betrayed, he now puts his faith only in God. He' s a single dad doing his best to grow his construction business and raise his young son. But haunted by an impulsive kiss Rochelle gave him fifteen years ago, her unexpected return has him rethinking things. He' s been given a second chance to win her heart. And this time, he plans to succeed.
Rochelle barely remembers Sandy, but she's drawn to his goodness. But just when she thinks she's found peace, her past catches up with her, and she finds herself in danger of losing the only safe haven she' s ever known.
A story of danger, love, and forgiveness. I loved all the characters, especially the little boy Jace and the bulldog Gus. Keep a box of tissues handy, I got weepy several times while reading this heartwarming and inspirational story.
E.G. Parsons, Author of Winter of the Heart
***
The story offers a message of love, hope, forgiveness and finding your way home.
M. McCoy
***
Ms. Pike has a unique ability to create such real people; people whose joys and griefs feel like one's own. Her characters and stories are gentle and yet she doesn't shy away from the dark side of human nature so that the shadows make the picture come to life.
Loretta Proctor, Author of The Crimson Bed
Buy About the Little Things
on Amazon
Thanks, Jean. Tell us where you get ideas for your books.
Each new day is full of stories. Some are small and completely forgettable (E.g. I was walking my dog and she ate a hot dog she found on the railroad tracks. The End.) But some stories will stop me in my tracks, stories so filled with beauty or sorrow they make me think, ‘Wow, that’s wonderful’ or ‘Oh, that’s dreadful’. Those are the stories I need to work through and make sense of through my writing. I have an insatiable curiosity about why people do the things they do. Things that stir me to love or hate, things I can’t seem to forget about, these are the things I build my stories on.
How do you get to know your characters?
Though I usually have a loose outline and an opening scene in mind, I spend hours contemplating my characters before I start to write their stories. Are they shy or outspoken? Short tempered or easygoing? What are their favorite foods? Did they grow up rich, poor, or somewhere in the middle? Where do they work, and do they enjoy their jobs, or are they in it for a paycheck? Do they live in a studio apartment in the city, or a house with a white picket fence? These are things I need to know before I can put them in situations and know how they will react. Sometimes we get off to a rough start. I’ll try to write a scene that’s not right, and they simply won’t speak, lol. I might send them happily off Black Friday shopping and then realize they have ochlophobia. Ok, scratch that scene and write it again. And again. But when I finally find my groove with them, it’s a magical thing!
Do you put yourself in your books?
Only in the sense that my characters’ lives often reflect bits and pieces of my own. You’ll find my people sweating on factory lines, standing behind cash registers, and frying donuts at four a.m. I take my own experiences and embellish them to make my stories real, only better. Obviously, I’ve never traveled in time, stumbled upon an enchanted cottage, or run off to California as some of my heroines have, but a lot of their more basic experiences are based on real life experiences. Some are my experiences as I would have liked them to be, and others are simply things that delighted or surprised me. An amazing blue heron I saw by the creek, an overheard argument in the grocery store, even the grumpy old bulldog I met at the vet’s office. Everything finds its way into my stories in some form.
Do you have any advice for aspiring writers?
Learn all you can about your craft. Read voraciously. Write, write, write, and when you get rejected and when it gets hard, straighten up your crown and write some more.
Bio: Changing seasons. Unexpected blessings. Love that lasts forever. These are a few of M. Jean Pike's favorite things. With a writing career that has spanned two decades, Jean combines an insatiable curiosity about humans and why they do what they do with a keen interest in the quirky and offbeat things in life to bring readers unforgettable tales of life, love, and the inner workings of the human heart. Her short works have been featured in "Chicken Soup for the Soul," "GRIT," the "Lutheran Digest," and others.
Visit Jean on her Author Blog and Twitter
Comments