We think if we take care of ourselves, we are neglecting our partner, our kids, our responsibilities.  But with time, we learn (often the hard way) that if we don’t or haven’t taken care of ourselves, we are unable to care for others or to fulfill our responsibilities.

That’s pretty much the long and short of it.  Just as on a flight, if the oxygen masks drop, you put your own on first, then help others.  Take care of yourself.  That increases your odds of staying healthy and able to take care of those you love and fulfilling your responsibilities.

Some life lessons are learned more easily than others.  I hope this is one you don’t skim past without considering… and that you grasp the importance of taking care of yourself easily.

Blessings,

Vicki

They say there are two unavoidable things in life:  death and taxes.  But in my experience, there are three.  That 3rd is change.

So it benefits us to accept it, and to do what we can to benefit from these changes.

People grow up.  They grow closer or apart.

People change jobs.  Willingly or unwillingly, due to desire or necessity.

People move.  Some want to, some must due to responsibilities or life or family demands.

We aren’t who we were, we are who we have become, or are becoming.  If we change, why would we expect other things not to change.

We don’t have to always like it.  We don’t even have to accept it.  But change will come and we’ll have to deal with what it brings either way.  That’s what makes it the third certainty in life.

Do you see the benefit in working with change rather than railing against it?

I do, and I’m going to work for smooth transitions.

Blessings,

Vicki

Blessings,

Vicki

To celebrate, I’ve started a new writing project.  THE DEAD MAN’S WIFE is a prequel to NO ONE WAS SUPPOSED TO DIE (the first Penny Crown novel). If all goes well, it will be published this fall.

When Penny Crown’s husband Mark is murdered, her world is shattered.  Then when she discovers discrepancies in what she’s being told happened to him and what actually happened, betrayal shatters her world again. To discover the truth, she must take risks that jeopardize her life, and she’s torn between fears.  Fear of leaving her daughter alone and orphaned.  Fear of the good and bad guys, both of whom warn her to leave things alone.

But Penny, being Penny, can’t let her husband’s death go unchallenged.  If she is ever to find peace and move on to a life after Mark Crown, she must find the truth.  She must see justice done.

That is my goal this spring.  To “bloom” this new book.  What’s yours?

Blessings,

Vicki

There’s a contest going on and it’s a fun one.  If you love mysteries and thrillers, it’s one you’re sure to enjoy.  The prizes are great—and there are two winners!  If you haven’t yet entered, be sure to do it ASAP.

Click the enter button below or go to:  https://www.booksweeps.com/giveaway/sherlock-holmes/

My new release, NO ONE WAS SUPPOSED TO DIE, is in this contest.  Here are the 20+ books that can be won by the two lucky winners, along with the Sherlock Holmes swag:

ENTER NOW

Good luck, everyone!

Blessings,

Vicki

In The Details

As authors, we diligently pour hours of research into our books just to make them as believable and as enjoyable as possible for our readers. The characters have to be relatable—the setting perfect and fitting for the storyline.

All the ingredients must be just right so that when we sit down to write the book, the story comes to life for us as well as the reader.

In other words, it’s all in the details.

When I wrote Deadly Mountain Escape, my latest release from Love Inspired Suspense, I knew I wanted a location that would be in the mountains, because in my mind they add another layer of suspense to a story. Mountains seem to draw their own weather. They create storms and attract them. They make the perfect place for danger.

I chose the Tobacco Root Mountains in Montana which rise high above the Ruby Valley. The valley is where my heroine’s family has owned a ranch for several generations. I created a small Amish settlement at the base of the mountains where my hero, Jonas Knowles, once lived before leaving the faith after his pregnant wife went into labor and died while he was trapping for fur in the mountains. Losing both Ivy and their baby, Jonas knew he couldn’t remain in the community and see Ivy everywhere he looked.

The story revolves around a search for missing women who are being trafficked but there is a backstory that ties the current missing women to the death of Deputy Charlotte Walker’s fiancé, as well as a secret that will reveal the bad guy has been hiding much closer than Charlotte ever imagined.

Deadly Mountain Escape features an adorable K-9 search and rescue dog named Annie. Annie is a bluetick coonhound and was the last dog trained by Charlotte’s fiancé Ryan before his death. Annie and Charlotte have a special connection because of Ryan. They’ve helped each survive the pain of the past year.

When Charlotte’s life is threatened, Jonas risks his to save her and another woman targeted for death. Thrown together by danger, Charlotte and Jonas must work to find the women who will be forced into trafficking and save them before they’re moved out of the county and into an unimaginable existence.

With the help of Abram, Jonas’ former brother-in-law, and Lainey, the young woman Jonas saved, they fight to survive the danger nipping at their heels and bring the bad guys to justice.

And with Annie’s assistance, Charlotte and Jonas find the future they both so richly deserve.

Every story has details that help to bring it to life for the reader. The characters’ backstory. The perfect location. A plot that will keep you turning pages.

And a happy ending that will make the emotional journey worthwhile. I hope that’s what readers find in Deadly Mountain Escape.

Here’s the story’s blurb:

Can this officer stop a trafficking ring?

Or will deadly criminals stop her first?

A search for a missing young woman becomes a nightmare for K-9 deputy Charlotte Walker when she stumbles on a trafficking ring and is captured. Death seems certain until she’s rescued by rancher Jonas Knowles. Together, they take shelter in the Amish community he left behind. But they can’t hide forever—not when the criminals are still after them, and countless girls are at risk…

Deadly Mountain Escape is now available at Amazon and other book retailers.

https://amzn.to/3Ug0rt1

https://books2read.com/u/3Go7G8

And be sure to sign up for my newsletter to find out news about my upcoming releases and to be part of my monthly giveaway that is for newsletter subscribers only! You can sign up for my newsletter here:  https://maryalford.net/email.

All the best,

Mary Alford

www.maryalford.net  

You can learn more about the book and/or watch the video on the Book’s page here.

I hope you enjoy this mystery.  I love the characters and had such a good time writing it!

It’s out in digital and print at Amazon.

As always, I am grateful for you, readers, for sticking with me and encouraging me to do what I love to do.

Blessings,

Vicki

Some things will and shall forever remain required.  In others, we have choices.  Sometimes they’re our choices and sometimes they’re thrust upon us by others.  The bottom line is either way we must make peace with them or they’ll make pieces of us.

I wrote an article on Stealing Joy years ago.  It’s about those times when others hurt us knowing they’re hurting us and they choose to do it anyway.  I’ve gotten a lot of notes from readers lately who find themselves in this position now, so I’m going to include the article here.

For those who would rather listen, there’s an audio/video of this on the youtube channel.  Just click the link at the bottom left of the page and it’ll take you to the channel.

I’m sorry so many are hurting.  I can tell you that you’re not alone.  Everywhere, we see and encounter walking wounded.  I hope that this article helps, and that if you’re on the hurtful end, maybe you’ll pause and reconsider your actions.  If you’re being hurt, I hope that this offers you some insight and tools that will help ease your pain, offer comfort, and ease your path to peace.

We’re on the precipice of a new year–and I hope it’s one of peace and blessings for you all.

Here’s the article:

We all have our soft underbelly; the one we avoid confrontation with whenever possible.  We’ve been there before, and we know how much it hurts.

Whether we call it someone stabbing us in the back, stepping on our toes or driving nails through our hearts, we get the feeling, and we’ve dealt with the many side-effects.

Joy, like life itself, is a fragile thing.  And it seems we’re all blessed (or cursed) with at least one person in our lives who is hellbent on making sure that they steal ours.  Whenever things are going well, or even when we’re in an unsettled state but we’re coping well and still finding joy in our lives, in comes that person to steal our joy and make us miserable.

Maybe the thief isn’t getting enough attention.  Maybe s/he’s secretly unhappy and can’t stand the sight of anyone else being joyful in his/her imperfect life.  Maybe s/he thrives on upset or drama.  Or feels that tearing others down builds him/her up.  It could be the thief is a control freak and feels threatened by you, so s/he makes it his or her business to not let you be too happy to keep you humble.  Or the thief could just not care.  So what if you’re hurt?  It’s not his or her fault if what s/he wants negatively impacts you.  Or–and this is the worst possible case, of course–the thief takes joy in deliberately hurting you and stealing your joy.

Yes, sad as it is to say, there really are people who thrive and blossom and find happiness in making other people miserable. Particularly people, who for one reason or the other, don’t like them.

When someone steals your joy once, you’re inclined to be forgiving and consider it an accident.  But what if the thief does this over and again?  Always at significant moments, or over events that are significant and meaningful to you?  What do you do then?  How do you cope?

OBJECTIVE ASSESSMENT.   When you’re on the receiving end of joy stealing, being objective is all but impossible.  Still, we have to do our best or remain a victim.

Try to determine why the thief is stealing your joy.  Only when you grasp their motivation can you deal with the problem constructively.

UNDERSTAND THE STAKES.  In these type situations, most often there’s something at risk. Something that puts you between the rock and the hard place.  Whether it’s your job, your reputation, or someone you love.  And you have to understand that cause-and-effect, action-and-reaction is hard at work.

So think through scenarios.  If the thief does this, you do that, where does that leave you?

What do you have at stake and are you willing to lose it?

Sometimes being the victim doesn’t enable you to avoid the penalty.  You’re caught in an emotional blackmail or hostage-type situation.  When the thief does this, anything you do results in the loss of x.  So before you do anything, you need to understand and accept that you well might lose.  Are you willing to live with that loss?

CONFRONTATION.  We typically hate it.  Some of us are better at it, more diplomatic, less emotional than others, but normal, healthy and stable people don’t relish confrontation or conflict or the upset both carry along with it.

Yet when our joy is being stolen, we have little choice.  We can step up and deal with the confrontation or allow ourselves to be victims and robbed of joy.

One or the other.  We must choose.  And we must live with our choices.

They’re never easy ones because of what is at stake and the risks of what we can lose.  More often than not, it means a great deal to us or the thief wouldn’t be trying to steal it.  So we must weigh the situation carefully and then choose.

CONSEQUENCES.  As unpleasant as confrontation and conflict is, if we’re able to work through it and come out a better place, it’s worth the effort.  Whether or not we’re able to get to that better place isn’t just our choice.  The thief gets a vote, too.  And when s/he weighs in, that vote can take many forms.  Anger, denial, outrage, justification, the false attribution of motives that are supposedly yours that are alien to you–any or all of those reactions are as apt to arise as a peaceful, imperfect solution to the problem or even a resolution with which you can be at peace.

The consequences could be alienation, distance, separation or divorce.  The loss of the job.  The loss of a loved one. The loss of exactly what you are trying to preserve.

Steep consequences are possible.  Very possible because reason and logic are skewed by emotions in these situations and because our perspectives are a complex network of experiences and events–some of which are related to our interactions with the joy stealer and some that go beyond that relationship and into other areas of our lives.  Things that happened with other people, back when we were kids.  Professional things.  Personal things.

The sum of all our experiences, values, and beliefs shape our perspective and the lens through which we see the thief and the joy s/he steals.

CONTROL.  The bottom line is that we can’t control others’ actions.  We can only control our reactions to their actions.  And we control our own actions.

We can choose to confront or withdraw.  To accept or distance ourselves from the thief.  To try–often for the umpteenth time–to be blunt and honest with the thief, about the pain they’re inflicting in the hope that they will choose not to deliberately hurt us again.  Or we can accept that the thief, regardless of motivation, is going to continue to hurt us and steal our joy and walk away.

In the end, we choose how much control and power over us we give the thief.

It is rarely an easy choice.  Rarely simple or free from many shades of gray.

It is seldom a choice we look forward to making or one we wanted to be placed in the position of having to make.  Yet if we do not, then doing nothing–willingly being the victim–does nothing to resolve the joy-stealing, only adds baggage to it.

So we assess the situation, no matter how much we wish we didn’t have to do it.

We understand the stakes, no matter how much we wish we never had to put things this dear to us at stake.

We endure the confrontation, even if it makes us sick for days or weeks afterward and our hearts yearn for peace.

We steel ourselves and accept the consequences for the course of action we’ve chosen to take, even if enacting it brings certain grief and mourning.

We control ourselves, our actions, making hard choices because we know that while avoiding them would be easier, living with avoiding them would not.

And we endure this, suffer through the upsets and losses we incur stopping the thief because when we look at life, its fragility and brevity–we are here but a moment–we know this truth:

If we are living without joy, we are already dead.

And that penalty is far too costly to pay.  ❧

I sincerely hope that this helps.

Blessings,

Vicki

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© 2003, 2022, Vicki Hinze. Hinze is the award-winning, USA Today bestselling author of over 50 novels in a variety of genres including, suspense, mystery, thriller, and romantic or faith-affirming thrillers. Her latest release is The Guardian, The Philanthropists, Book 2. She holds a MFA in Creative Writing and a Ph.D. in Philosophy, Theocentric Business and Ethics. Contact: www.vickihinze.com. Subscribe to Vicki’s Newsletter.