The REVEAL....

AND THE




RUNNER






UP 





IS......    DRUMROLLLLLLL

For twenty-three years I’ve written under the name Sandra Ardoin, however, I go by Sandy. I blog twice a week, Tuedays and Fridays, at www.sandraardoin.com and would love to have you stop by to read my book reviews, guest author posts, miscellaneous talk about Christian fiction, or answer my What Say You? questions. The last Friday of each month is High-five Friday!! when we celebrate the recent accomplishments that have made various writers dance.

Sandra’s cards, posters, devotions, and short stories have been published for years. Currently, you’ll find one of her stories in Family Ties, a children’s collection.

In the garden, I might be considered a mum—a late bloomer. Over thirty before marrying, in my mid-thirties before having a child, in my—mm-hmm—before completing my first novel. I’m a Christian, a reader of any era fiction in the mystery/suspense/romance genres, a gardener, a horse lover (it’s been years since my baby passed on), and a writer anxious for publication of my first novel. Love the NFL, NASCAR and PBR. Don’t care much for cooking and cleaning, but no one said life was fair. And, yes, that’s me driving around with a trotting camel on my car.

Question for readers: If you pulled Waiting for Yesterday from a bookstore shelf and it popped open to the pages with the excerpt found on this site, would the scene tempt you to read more?

Give us your elevator pitch for this excerpt; then share a 250-word enticing blurb.

When a dangerous foe threatens Abby Parker’s family and friends, the man who arrives to save them turns out to be a despised gunman from her past.

In the fall of 1884, a shooter leaves Abby Parker desperate and with two choices—allow the unwelcome Will McDermott to seek the truth about the troubles around Jeremiah, Texas, or throw him off her land and risk additional danger to herself and her wounded brother, Trace. As she loses her heart to this man she had detested for years, she struggles to reconcile her plans for the future with those God has for her.

Will McDermott and Trace Parker parted ways seven years earlier. Those years have borne witness to the changes in Will’s life—marriage, the loss of his wife, and God’s forgiveness. The last thing he wants is a reminder of the time he spent with Trace and their dead partner, but he can’t ignore the telegram requesting his help. He owes Trace his life. What Will doesn’t expect to find at the end of his journey to the Parker ranch is his old friend lying unconscious and the business end of Abby’s shotgun pointed at his chest.

Will fights to protect Abby from unknown assailants and her own pigheadedness. He never imagines the challenge means protecting his heart from the prickly blonde, nor admitting to anyone but God that he and her brother killed a friend.

 Abby stumbles upon the true identity of the shooter—someone motivated by greed and bent on vengeance against the men she loves most. She determines to thwart his intentions, even if it puts her own life in jeopardy.

Tell us briefly what you love about writing in general, and what you love about this book.

Writing excites me on multiple levels. It’s something I wanted to do growing up, but feared dying and leaving what I wrote for others to read. How embarrassing! Once I got up the courage to actually put words to paper, I found it a terrific way for this introvert to follow the Great Commission to tell others about Jesus. Fiction, my writing passion, lets me take those random scenes and bits of dialog in my head and create a story I hope will interest others and provide a spiritual message that points the reader to greater faith.

What I love about Waiting for Yesterday is the friction between the characters. As in any relationship, lack of communication causes Abby and Will needless problems. However, that same communication dearth leads to a—sometimes painful, sometimes humorous—tension between them.

Please share the top three writing-related things you've learned over the past six months.

There is always something new to learn or relearn.

The first is something reiterated to me in the past month—patience for God’s timing. He has a plan for my novel writing and sometimes that plan doesn’t work fast enough for me. But He has used this opportunity on Clash of the Titles, as well as other recent successes, to encourage me to keep going.

Secondly, I think I’m beginning to understand the keys to writing a good synopsis. In preparing the synopsis for my current work-in-progress, I found it much easier to do when I began with the goals, motivations, and conflicts of my main characters. I worked outward from there, recounting the major plots points (or turning points) in my story and the climax. Before, I had focused on a sequential listing of events and characters, which can make a synopsis confusing and cluttered.

My third revelation? Oh, boy. It’s been a long time since I studied grammar.

What's your next step toward getting this work published?

I’m in the process of seeking an agent that will represent this novel and my future works to traditional publishers. Queries are the order of the day.