Blue Water Ink

noreply@blogger.com (Julie Ackerman Link) — Fri, 01 Jan 2010 05:00:00 +0000

Thank you for stopping by to visit Blue Water Ink.

Since 1987, Blue Water Ink has been providing services to help publishers produce the best books possible for their writers and readers.

Please take some time to explore our portfolio. Then contact us to discuss how we can work together on your publishing project.

TRUST YOUR EDITOR

noreply@blogger.com (Julie Ackerman Link) — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 05:00:00 +0000

Do you trust Your editor?

noreply@blogger.com (Julie Ackerman Link) — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 16:05:00 +0000

Lunch at Meijer Gardens.

Editing Letter

noreply@blogger.com (Julie Ackerman Link) — Thu, 07 May 2009 14:18:00 +0000

Really, editors are very nice people who only want what is best for the manuscript!

noreply@blogger.com (Julie Ackerman Link) — Fri, 01 May 2009 04:00:00 +0000

Link to picture.

noreply@blogger.com (Julie Ackerman Link) — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 04:00:00 +0000

What Is Killing Newspapers and Journalism? Bonnie Erbe

Hard Times in Book Publishing

noreply@blogger.com (Julie Ackerman Link) — Fri, 13 Feb 2009 00:40:00 +0000

noreply@blogger.com (Julie Ackerman Link) — Sat, 31 Jan 2009 05:15:00 +0000

A Survey

noreply@blogger.com (Julie Ackerman Link) — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 05:00:00 +0000

Which sentence is better?

"There is no music during a musical rest, but the rest is part of the making of the music."

"There is no music in a rest, but there is the making of music in it."

From the Typewriter to the Bookstore: A Publishing Story

noreply@blogger.com (Julie Ackerman Link) — Thu, 15 Jan 2009 17:00:00 +0000

Writing

noreply@blogger.com (Julie Ackerman Link) — Thu, 01 Jan 2009 05:00:00 +0000

The thoughts and ideas are there, the audience is waiting, but the right words remain elusive.

noreply@blogger.com (Julie Ackerman Link) — Thu, 01 Jan 2009 05:00:00 +0000

Above All, Love in the Grand Rapids Press

noreply@blogger.com (Julie Ackerman Link) — Sun, 14 Dec 2008 18:31:00 +0000

My friend Ann Byle mentioned Above All, Love in an article in today's Grand Rapids Press.

Need copies for Christmas gifts? Order from the following:
Discovery House Publishers
Amazon
Barnes and Noble
Me (send e-mail)

Mike Huckabee and Me

noreply@blogger.com (Julie Ackerman Link) — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 19:55:00 +0000

Jay and I went to the Mike Huckabee book signing at Schuler Books & Music last night. The line was moving so fast that Jay didn't even have time to get in the picture. I did, however, talk fast enough to tell the former governor that I almost got to work with him on a book several years ago. Len Goss, a former Zondervan colleague, contacted me when he was the editorial director at Broadman and Holman and asked if I'd like to be the ghost writer for a book Huckabee was writing for them when he was governor of Alabama. Unfortunately, I had a conflicting deadline, so I had to decline the offer.

Zondervan Buys onthecity.org from Mars Hill Church

noreply@blogger.com (Julie Ackerman Link) — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 03:48:00 +0000

Our church could sure use this! I wonder when it will be available. It looks better (and easier) than Facebook. Go here to watch a video demonstration.

Sherwood Wirt

noreply@blogger.com (Julie Ackerman Link) — Wed, 12 Nov 2008 00:48:00 +0000

The San Diego Christian Writer's Guild reports the death of founder Sherwood Wirt on November 8.

Good Example of Bad Layout

noreply@blogger.com (Julie Ackerman Link) — Tue, 11 Nov 2008 18:43:00 +0000

Business may be bad in the furniture industry, but not so bad that they're using their trucks to steal baby food!

This was on the front page of woodtv.com earlier today. In journalism school, we call this very careless juxtaposition of headlines and photos.

Letter to Losers

noreply@blogger.com (Julie Ackerman Link) — Tue, 04 Nov 2008 17:00:00 +0000

Depending on your political persuasion, you will either be glad or sad when the results of today’s presidential election are made known. Those whose candidate wins will be amenable to the idea of submitting to the authority of the government he establishes. Most others will submit, but they may have trouble following the guidelines established for Christians by the apostle Paul.

In a letter to Titus, who was working among believers on the island of Crete, a place notorious for its unruly inhabitants, Paul wrote that Christians should not only submit to ruling authorities but also be peaceable, considerate, and to do good without slandering anyone. Based on what we know about the immorality in ancient Crete, there were good reasons to say bad things about people living and ruling there, but Paul warned Christians not to do it.

In fact, seven times in the short letter, Paul mentioned the importance of doing good instead (loving what is good, 1:8; teaching what is good, 2:3; doing what is good, 2:7, 14, 3:1, 8, 14).

Paul’s letter is a timely reminder that Christians are to do what is good for people whether or not we approve of their values or agree with their policies. It may not be easy, but it’s the right thing to do.

<<<>>>

Christians are a constructive force in society when we refuse to be destructive in our speech and behavior.

Read a Banned Book

noreply@blogger.com (Julie Ackerman Link) — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 04:00:00 +0000

The last week in September is Banned Books Week.

Sarah Palin and Our Daily Bread

noreply@blogger.com (Julie Ackerman Link) — Sat, 13 Sep 2008 15:49:00 +0000

Quite some time ago I wrote an Our Daily Bread devotional titled "Whose Side Is God On? It was published August 20 of this year. In it I used the Abraham Lincoln quotation that Sarah Palin cited during her interview with Charlie Gibson. You can watch the relevant part of the interview here:

You can read the ODB devotional here.

So now I'm wondering if Sarah Palin reads Our Daily Bread. Wouldn't that be cool?!

The Glass Ceiling

noreply@blogger.com (Julie Ackerman Link) — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 15:36:00 +0000

Jonathan Alter made a comment in his "Between the Lines" column in Newsday about Sarah Palin that shows him to be just another grain of sand in the glass ceiling:

The balance between work and family, always a ticklish issue, will be brought into bold relief by the fact that the Palins' fifth child, Trig, was born with Down syndrome in April. Todd Palin, a commercial fisherman, may shoulder the bulk of the child-rearing duties in their family. But many voters will nonetheless wonder whether Palin should undertake the rigors of the vice presidency (and perhaps the presidency) while caring for a disabled infant. The subject will no doubt arise on "Oprah" and in other venues.

His use of the phrase "many voters will nonetheless wonder" is a weak attempt to make someone other than himself (in other words, to keep himself invisible, i.e., like glass!) responsible for raising the typical kind of question that has been used for centuries to keep women "in their place," which, as Alter apparently believes, is at home when there is a disabled child in the family. I suppose the good news is that his comment indicates that women have made some progress. It used to be that they belonged at home whenever there were any children in the family.

Grammar Police "Sentenced"

noreply@blogger.com (Julie Ackerman Link) — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 20:35:00 +0000

Self-styled vigilantes wiped out errors on signs across the United States

Associated Press

PHOENIX - When it comes to marking up historic signs, good grammar is a bad defense.

Two self-styled vigilantes against typos who defaced a more than 60-year-old, hand-painted sign at Grand Canyon National Park were sentenced to probation and banned from national parks for a year. They had removed an extraneous apostrophe and added a comma to the sign.

Click here to read the entire article.

Above All, Love

noreply@blogger.com (Julie Ackerman Link) — Fri, 15 Aug 2008 02:00:00 +0000

Above All, Love is now available for purchase. Tonight we hosted a party to launch the book. Here are a few pictures.

Me with my new rock from Patty and Steve Doren and my cake.

My rock and my cake.

The "M" Word

noreply@blogger.com (Julie Ackerman Link) — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 00:43:00 +0000

When speaking to authors, never use the "m" word, says Jonathan Karp, publisher and editor-in-chief of Twelve, an imprint within the Hachette Book Group.

Many years ago, as a new editorial assistant at a venerable publishing house, I was warned by a senior colleague never to use a certain word when telling authors what would happen to their unsold books. The forbidden word was . . . [click here to read the entire article]

Be quiet and eat your Wheaties

noreply@blogger.com (Julie Ackerman Link) — Tue, 15 Jul 2008 12:15:00 +0000

David Wroblewski is as surprised as anyone by the success of his first novel, The Story of Edgar Sawtelle. Bestselling author Stephen King wrote this about it:

I flat-out loved The Story of Edgar Sawtelle. Dog-lovers in particular will be riveted by this story, because the canine world has never been explored with such imagination or emotional resonance. Yet in the end, this isn't a novel about dogs or heartland America — although it is a deeply American work of literature. It's a novel about the human heart, and the mysteries that live there, understood but impossible to articulate. Yet in the person of Edgar Sawtelle, a mute boy who takes three of his dogs on a brave and dangerous odyssey, Wroblewski does articulate them, and splendidly. I closed the book with that regret readers feel only after experiencing the best stories: It's over, you think, and I won't read another one this good for a long, long time. [Click here to read this and other reviews.]

Here's an excerpt from a PW interview with the author.

PW: Having made such a splash with your debut, are you worried about novel #2, and have you started work on it?

DW: I’m not worried about the second novel because one of the things I know is that you just have to sit down and do the work. So it’s not like I’m wringing my hands in any way over it. I have a basic story in mind; I have a character that I’m crazy about and I have a set of moments that are perfectly clear to me about what’s going to happen. But it’s in its very early days; it won’t be for a couple of weeks before I get going. But I’m sort of pawing at the ground and I know that you have to get a first draft done before you know what you’ve got. My sense is that I need to be quiet and eat my Wheaties and do the work—and it’s gonna be what it’s gonna be. Basically I’ve no anxiety about living up in any sense to Edgar: it’s going to be a different story and it’ll have its strengths and weaknesses. I think it’s the only way to do it; otherwise you just tie yourself up in knots. I’m 48 years old and I’ve been making software for 30 years in my other career. I know that to get stuff done you sit down and it’s work. I think that’s one of the advantages to having an experience like this a little later in life than when you’re 20. [Click here to read the entire interview.]