Transcript
Speaker: You know, the world is starving for hope and encouragement.
Speaker: They're starving for it.
Speaker: And if we as Christian artists, whether our art is for the purpose of evangelism or for the purpose of glorifying God through beauty, it all shines a light.
Speaker: And when we gather together, that light is stronger and it's more attractive.
Speaker: Welcome back everybody to Artists of the Way.
Speaker: I am your host John and I'm joined today by Suzie Finkbeiner.
Speaker: Suzie is a good friend of mine we met in Hamlet this year.
Speaker: She was my mother.
Speaker: But Suzie primarily is an author.
Speaker: That's her main artistic outlet.
Speaker: She has published nine books.
Speaker: Were they all through Baker Publishing?
Speaker: Through, I've worked with three different publishers.
Speaker: Okay, which three?
Speaker: White Fire, which is a small press out of Maryland.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: Kriegel and Revell, which is Baker Publishing Group, both out of Grand Rapids.
Speaker: Nice.
Speaker: Awesome.
Speaker: Cool.
Speaker: Susie, how are you doing today?
Speaker: Great.
Speaker: Great.
Speaker: Great.
Speaker: Cool.
Speaker: Tired.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: You've been promoting your new release, right?
Speaker: I have been.
Speaker: Cool.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: This is sort of a promotion, but sort of not.
Speaker: This is much better.
Speaker: Take that.
Speaker: Promoters, dab.
Speaker: I had to narrate the dab because none of you guys would see it.
Speaker: He actually did the dab.
Speaker: I do.
Speaker: I waited until the dab was out of fashion and then I decided to pick it up.
Speaker: You might be an early, I don't know, member of the middle-aged group.
Speaker: Oh, I definitely am.
Speaker: I wear khakis.
Speaker: Nobody wears khakis in their 20s.
Speaker: I did because I had a job that required it.
Speaker: Yeah, fair.
Speaker: I choose to wear khakis.
Speaker: It's good to know what you love.
Speaker: Susie, I have two questions that I ask everybody in each podcast.
Speaker: So I'm going to start with those two questions.
Speaker: First is, what are you working on right now?
Speaker: I am actually working on a novella.
Speaker: So this is a new thing for me.
Speaker: It is one third of a collection with a couple of my friends.
Speaker: And so it's stretching me a lot.
Speaker: It is...
Speaker: requiring me to be more attention attentive to everything because it's so much shorter.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: But, um, so I'm working on that and it's fun to try something different.
Speaker: Cool.
Speaker: Awesome.
Speaker: Second question.
Speaker: How has God been using art in your life recently?
Speaker: This is a big question.
Speaker: And I feel like that is the way that God chooses to use me most in my life is through art.
Speaker: And I think right now the way I'm seeing it is...
Speaker: That God is using art to help me connect to other people and to build relationships.
Speaker: And part of that was getting involved at Master Arts Theater.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And getting to know so many people that I wouldn't have known otherwise.
Speaker: Mm-hmm.
Speaker: And...
Speaker: And making connections with readers, readers who, you know, maybe struggle with something that I wrote about in one of my books or people that just are needing a lot of hope and encouragement.
Speaker: So that's, that's really, that makes it feel less like I'm just a little art person doing my thing in my living room while the kids are at school.
Speaker: It makes it more meaningful.
Speaker: Yeah, that's cool.
Speaker: So you have a book releasing this week, the week the episode is coming out, called The All-American, right?
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: Cool.
Speaker: What is that about?
Speaker: It's set in 1952, and it's narrated by two sisters, so Bertha and Flossie.
Speaker: Bertha's 16, and Flossie is 11, and they...
Speaker: are not your typical 1950s girls.
Speaker: So Bertha is a tomboy who plays baseball with the boys in the neighborhood.
Speaker: And Flossie is just really wants to be a grownup.
Speaker: Mm-hmm.
Speaker: And so she can't be.
Speaker: So she's trying to figure all this out.
Speaker: And their lives are just kind of upended when their father is accused of being part of the Communist Party in Detroit.
Speaker: Oh.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yikes.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: The Red Scare was not pretty.
Speaker: And so it joins baseball and literature and communism and Shakespeare all together.
Speaker: into one book somehow.
Speaker: I don't know how I fit it all in, but it's in there.
Speaker: You did it.
Speaker: I did it.
Speaker: Nice.
Speaker: That sounds cool.
Speaker: Thank you.
Speaker: Has there been like a favorite moment while working on that book?
Speaker: Something that's been especially cool about it?
Speaker: You know, I think that writing Flossie's character
Speaker: was always a highlight because I never knew what the girl was going to do.
Speaker: So I would think she's going to do this and then she would do the exact opposite.
Speaker: And that was fun.
Speaker: And the relationship she has with her father was very special.
Speaker: That's cool.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And it's in her parts.
Speaker: that I quote Hamlet like several times before I even knew I would ever be in Hamlet.
Speaker: That's so fun.
Speaker: I know.
Speaker: So there were parts where you would have a line and I'd just be like, well, I know that one.
Speaker: Nice.
Speaker: That's awesome.
Speaker: Where did you find the name Flossie?
Speaker: That's such a fun name.
Speaker: It's a nickname for Florence.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: That's cool.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And I've always, Flossie and Bertha were two character names that I've been saving up for just the right book, and this was the right book.
Speaker: Nice.
Speaker: That's awesome.
Speaker: What was it that got you started writing?
Speaker: What got you interested in it in the first place?
Speaker: Since I was a child, I was a storyteller, and often my mom called that lying.
Speaker: Oh, no.
Speaker: It was lying.
Speaker: A lot of it.
Speaker: I remember I was in kindergarten, and...
Speaker: The teacher said, you know, let's get to know each other.
Speaker: Everyone go around and tell each other something about themselves.
Speaker: And I said, I'm a ballerina and I can play piano.
Speaker: Neither of those were true.
Speaker: But I was creating a story.
Speaker: And because I wanted to be those things.
Speaker: So story was always really important to me.
Speaker: We were a story together.
Speaker: Centric family, lots of stories that we told.
Speaker: My dad's a writer.
Speaker: So it all just seemed to be natural.
Speaker: And I didn't ever think it would be a career.
Speaker: And it was kind of shocking when it happened.
Speaker: How did it happen?
Speaker: I started as a playwright.
Speaker: And I had one of my plays published.
Speaker: Don't go seeking for it.
Speaker: It's not great.
Speaker: Please.
Speaker: I see the look in your eyes.
Speaker: Do not do it.
Speaker: And then I was in a job and I needed to resign for various reasons.
Speaker: And someone said, well, the upside of this is that now you can write your novel.
Speaker: And I was like, that's crazy.
Speaker: And then I tried.
Speaker: And, um,
Speaker: You know, you write a novel and then you think, well, maybe I should get it published.
Speaker: And back in those days, self-publishing wasn't as accessible as it is now.
Speaker: And so that was not feasible for me.
Speaker: And I was approached by an editor through my blog.
Speaker: And that is not how it usually goes.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Because no one blogs anymore.
Speaker: That's true.
Speaker: Thank goodness.
Speaker: It's like an ancient precursor to...
Speaker: videos and podcasts and stuff.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I much prefer podcasts.
Speaker: If any editor wants to discover me or my wife through this podcast, probably my wife.
Speaker: She's a better writer than I am.
Speaker: Well, that's really sweet of you.
Speaker: Also, if you're an editor who knows me and you'd like to contact the Wilsons, just send me a text.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: That's awesome.
Speaker: Do you remember what the first thing you wrote was?
Speaker: Ever, ever, ever?
Speaker: Ever, ever, ever.
Speaker: Um, it was, it was a story that I was writing with my friends.
Speaker: Um, so there were four of us girls and we were total nerds, like such, such nerds.
Speaker: And we would write stories together.
Speaker: And that was a lot of fun.
Speaker: And usually it was about horses and giving them cool names and making up stories.
Speaker: And then we would act out the stories at recess.
Speaker: So it was like My Little Pony before My Little Pony.
Speaker: With real horses.
Speaker: Nice.
Speaker: You should sue them.
Speaker: Actually, My Little Pony was around then.
Speaker: I'm not quite that old John.
Speaker: I don't know when My Little Pony started.
Speaker: I'm not very well versed in the timeline of My Little Pony.
Speaker: Well, I can forgive you.
Speaker: Thank you.
Speaker: You're welcome.
Speaker: Did you ever have any struggle with your faith and your writing together?
Speaker: Did they ever clash?
Speaker: This is a really good question.
Speaker: Oh, goodness.
Speaker: When I was writing my first novel, it was about... It was a mother-daughter story, and in it, there was a lot of dark stuff, including sex trafficking.
Speaker: So there came a point when I had to make a decision...
Speaker: Do I include the F word?
Speaker: Ah, yep.
Speaker: Or Jesus?
Speaker: Because in the publishing world, you really can't do both.
Speaker: Yep.
Speaker: So I had to wrestle with that.
Speaker: And I knew that I could not divorce my worldview from my writing.
Speaker: Yep.
Speaker: And that the only way to write the story with any sort of hope that I could comprehend was to include Jesus.
Speaker: And I really wanted the book to get published.
Speaker: And so I had to make that decision.
Speaker: And there are ways to get around Jesus.
Speaker: using certain words.
Speaker: But for me, in that particular book, there was no way of getting around the fact that Jesus is the one that saves and the one that allows us to be overcomers.
Speaker: And so that was hard.
Speaker: But I went to a Christian bookstore while I was wrestling with this.
Speaker: And I was just like, there's got to be something on the shelf that
Speaker: that is more on the end of what I write.
Speaker: Because at the time, it was almost exclusively Amish and romance.
Speaker: And I wasn't either of those.
Speaker: And so I walked over to where they had like other books.
Speaker: And it was like, it wasn't the word other, but it was like
Speaker: Miscellaneous.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: Something like that.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And I saw a book by a woman named Lisa Sampson.
Speaker: And it had a very different cover.
Speaker: I grabbed it.
Speaker: It was called Embrace Me.
Speaker: And in this book, the characters were smoking and they were dealing with real life issues.
Speaker: And there was a lot of redemption in the pain that people were facing.
Speaker: And I thought, okay, there is a place for me here.
Speaker: And then I read everything Lisa Sampson wrote except for her Scottish Highlander books that were her earliest books.
Speaker: Then she left the romance world.
Speaker: And I was actually able to meet her.
Speaker: And I was so excited that I scared her a little.
Speaker: Oh, no.
Speaker: Because I was talking normally.
Speaker: And then as the conversation progressed, I went up and up in pitch.
Speaker: And then I did it.
Speaker: We are now good friends.
Speaker: But at the time, she was like, oh.
Speaker: I'm so glad that she didn't call security over or anything.
Speaker: Good first impression for her friendship.
Speaker: Exactly.
Speaker: Just making them think you're slightly unhinged.
Speaker: But she didn't forget me.
Speaker: That's true.
Speaker: I guess arguably better than how we met just shouting at each other in an audition room about your marriage decision.
Speaker: We'll put it that way.
Speaker: Et cetera.
Speaker: Yeah, I remember going home after meeting you and saying, that guy is so intense.
Speaker: No, nobody would call me intense.
Speaker: I'm not intense.
Speaker: I've had people call you that, you know.
Speaker: Anyway, you are pretty intense, but in a good way.
Speaker: Thank you.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Do you feel like there's any, like, common themes that you are drawn towards in your writing or things that you keep returning to to explore?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Families, whether it be family by blood or family that you choose.
Speaker: Found family trope.
Speaker: Found family.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Oh, tropes.
Speaker: That's another topic.
Speaker: But I think that I am very curious about what keeps people together, you know, because...
Speaker: There's no actual literal chain binding people.
Speaker: And yet they still work toward making things work and keeping things together.
Speaker: And that is always really interesting to me.
Speaker: Has that common theme or idea deepened anything in your spiritual life as you've been exploring that?
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: Number one, it makes me see people differently.
Speaker: And really, I try to...
Speaker: understand where people come from as far as families go so that I can have more compassion.
Speaker: And for me, when I'm not having compassion, that's where I'm in a not great place, you know, spiritually.
Speaker: But also just seeing how God can redeem different bad situations and how God can heal people's hearts and give them
Speaker: a group, give them people that can be a blessing to them and that they can be a blessing to.
Speaker: It's just, that is just, that's hope.
Speaker: And that is God's compassion for us and God's understanding of our need for community.
Speaker: And so it just really, it
Speaker: it builds in me this deep sense of gratitude and also to understand that God is a God who wants relationship with us and wants to be the center of that for us.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Even when it's really like crappy, God wants to pull things back together.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And he doesn't give up when I really would like to sometimes.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yep.
Speaker: I feel that.
Speaker: I get that.
Speaker: On that like topic of community and like people needing community, because I think that that's a core need.
Speaker: And I think for artists, especially that's a core need, but I think writing could sometimes tend toward being one of those more solitary arts.
Speaker: Um, I think of like that and painting where you're just like in a room and you're, you're
Speaker: plunking out and carving this thing out, but it's all kind of in your head with the computer or the canvas or the typewriter and all that.
Speaker: Are there some ways that you've seen God bless you as a writer and artist with community when you've needed it?
Speaker: Oh, for sure.
Speaker: I think that living in Grand Rapids, I have an embarrassment of writer friends here.
Speaker: There are so many writers here.
Speaker: And I've been very fortunate to have communities with writers groups and going to writers conferences around here and meeting writers who might not be writing deep theology, might not be writing for a Christian market, but writing for a general market.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And just seeing how we all do it.
Speaker: But I know not everybody has that.
Speaker: And so having online communities really means a lot.
Speaker: And for instance, this past week I was in Portland at a writer's conference.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And I connected with two authors that I have known for a decade completely online.
Speaker: And this was the first time we've met.
Speaker: That's awesome.
Speaker: And, you know, the internet's not always the best.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: But for this, it is really great because it seems like I've been around them my whole life.
Speaker: That's how it felt.
Speaker: And just knowing that we...
Speaker: We all are struggling with the same things, that we face the same adversity, and just knowing that someone else understands the struggles of the publishing world.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And being able to connect in that way, and also the whole platform is not fun.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: If you see it as platform building.
Speaker: So being able to commiserate on that and say, you know, this is how I'm doing it to make it feel more authentic and just sharing ideas.
Speaker: Because I feel like that's almost a...
Speaker: sad, necessary evil of the modern day artist.
Speaker: I don't remember who I was talking to the other day.
Speaker: It might have been our friend Tim.
Speaker: But I think one of us said something to the effect of like the internet is the modern day patron for the artist.
Speaker: Where before we used to be sponsored by like Roman aristocracy and now it's like you got to get sponsored by the internet and you have to build that platform.
Speaker: And if you don't do that, then it seems like it's really hard for that to become something more than just a hobby that you're doing on the side.
Speaker: It's true.
Speaker: It's very true, especially if you want to go the traditional publishing route.
Speaker: they require that you have a certain amount of people that follow you and that you engage with them.
Speaker: And so it can get to the point where you feel like you're using your readers.
Speaker: And I don't like that.
Speaker: I don't ever want, and not only that, but using authors who are maybe a step or two ahead of you because they have a bigger audience, they've got a bigger name, and they're
Speaker: That just is so gross.
Speaker: It's so gross.
Speaker: And I've been in situations where I do, I do need to contact that other writer.
Speaker: But I'm just like, ugh.
Speaker: So I'm like, I'm only contacting you because I want to be your friend.
Speaker: I am not going to ask anything of you.
Speaker: Because I've had people who do that with me.
Speaker: And it's just... Well, yeah.
Speaker: And I mean, I'm even thinking about the podcast as I've been starting it.
Speaker: Like, there's people that I, like, think about having on and stuff.
Speaker: And my brain, like, the entrepreneurial part of my brain keeps going, like, ah, well, this would be a great connection to...
Speaker: to grow it or get it in front of a different audience, but like trying to keep that more authentic and human and personal instead of trying to find those ways to squirm into somebody's spotlight and get a piece of it, you know?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: It's, it is tempting, but I also think that if you approach things, anything in the whole, with the whole intention of,
Speaker: I want to build relationship with you.
Speaker: And I think that we have something that we can use together to serve people.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I think that the times that I have done marketing, air quotes, marketing things,
Speaker: that have been unsuccessful.
Speaker: It was when I was pushing because I was trying to accomplish a, you know, financial goal or a material goal.
Speaker: But when I have approached it as I just really want to get to know this person and, and see what makes them tick and, and maybe encourage them, then it goes so much better.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And people will offer that.
Speaker: To help you.
Speaker: If they know that you're a real person and that you see them as a real person.
Speaker: And I don't think that you're like going to be like that.
Speaker: Thanks.
Speaker: It's not you.
Speaker: No.
Speaker: And I mean, thinking again, like theologically, thinking about the church and like the way that God wants the church to operate in the world.
Speaker: Like it is all relational and it's all about serving.
Speaker: Like, yeah.
Speaker: people who lead are supposed to be the ultimate servers.
Speaker: And so if Christians are like a holy set apart people in the world that are kind of leading the way through evangelism and stuff, we should be serving.
Speaker: We should be building relationship because we can't hammer the Bible into somebody's head.
Speaker: Oh, please don't.
Speaker: So then as like artists to think about, well, you know, when you're trying to live in community, it shouldn't necessarily be about, I got to get my community because it'll help my art or,
Speaker: I got to get with this person because they can make it better or I can use their clout or this or that, but more about that sort of Acts vision of the church where they're eating together and serving and sharing each other's wealth just because of the love and Christ binding them together.
Speaker: Well, and honestly, like the more that we can join together, we can take, you know, the world is starving for hope and encouragement.
Speaker: They're starving for it.
Speaker: And if we as Christian artists, whether our art is for the purpose of evangelism or for the purpose of glorifying God through beauty, it all shines a light.
Speaker: And when we gather together, that light is stronger and it's more attractive.
Speaker: And so that's the way that we can see it so that it's not icky.
Speaker: It's serving the world by shining this hopeful light.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And I think, so looking at the theatrical world that I come from, I
Speaker: I've heard a lot of, well, so Master Arts, which the theater that I'm on the board at and that you did Hamlet at, there is a lot of people at Master Arts that a lot of times we get people that are not Christian.
Speaker: And we have some regular people who keep coming to Master Arts that kind of view it as their community and like artistic base of operations that do not believe in the Christian God or the Christian worldview.
Speaker: at all, but there's something that keeps drawing them back.
Speaker: And I've heard a lot of people who either came from a different
Speaker: theater and then came to Master Arts or started at Master Arts and then went somewhere else.
Speaker: Like I have a friend who tried to do professional theater after Master Arts.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Scary.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: And just them talking about the difference in the community.
Speaker: Like there's a piece during Tech and Show Week when you're rehearsing every night somehow at Master Arts.
Speaker: Like you don't try and kill each other.
Speaker: Whereas at a lot of other theaters, like everybody goes crazy.
Speaker: And...
Speaker: there just isn't that like that like kill or be killed mentality like with like trying to achieve something artistically like I when I auditioned for Hunchback me and my brother and another really good friend were like probably three of I think about the four top contenders for Quasimodo and that was like one of my dream roles and we were all just totally okay with
Speaker: whatever we got, which I feel like does not happen a lot.
Speaker: But when you have Christ at the center as being the thing that's binding that together, there's just this sort of grace about the community that I think a lot of times artistic communities maybe don't always have the opportunity to have, which maybe is just also because we're a community theater and we're not doing it.
Speaker: Our livelihoods don't depend on getting the role.
Speaker: So that probably plays a factor too.
Speaker: But...
Speaker: Yeah, I think that definitely it takes a certain level of community mindedness to achieve that kind of cheering on each other, even when they get a role you want or a publishing contract that you want or an award.
Speaker: My industry has awards season, and it is my least favorite few months because it's just imposter syndrome to the max with all of us.
Speaker: Um, even the winners are like, I didn't deserve it.
Speaker: Um, so it's, but when you can authentically cheer someone else on, and that is just, that is, I think that that is pleasing to God.
Speaker: And it's just glorifying to him to see that his kids are, are like rooting for each other.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And, um,
Speaker: I remember there were many times, and you never experienced this because we were all staring at you.
Speaker: When we were, and Shay, John's wife, his lovely wife, and me and Tyler, the assistant director, and so many of us would be standing behind a curtain that we could see and they couldn't see out.
Speaker: Mm-hmm.
Speaker: And we would watch you do these super emotional monologues.
Speaker: And we were all just, for me at least, I was holding my breath sometimes because I was like, get it, go, go, go, go.
Speaker: And just there were times when you would just do it so well.
Speaker: And we would be like, yes, you know, cheering you on.
Speaker: And Hamlet is a part that many people want for some reason.
Speaker: it's a hard role themselves through that emotional wringer and give themselves existential crises yeah but i was like i love this community of people because we are all here just like wanting for you to do the to do the part the way we know you can and so it's just such an exciting thing when when my writer friends i've got friends that just
Speaker: They desire for each other to succeed, not necessarily in the ways that professionally we would hope for, like book sales and awards, but just succeed in telling a good story.
Speaker: I have a friend, Amanda Dykes, and she's like one of the sweetest people.
Speaker: And...
Speaker: She is, she makes a point of contacting authors like when she thinks that they've written something amazing and she just, this woman has won like the biggest awards in Christian fiction.
Speaker: She has been a bestseller for,
Speaker: She is getting all these opportunities and but she makes sure to reach out to people and just say, I would love to learn from you and just, you know, learn how you did this.
Speaker: It was so incredible.
Speaker: And she has nothing.
Speaker: She has nothing to gain personally from.
Speaker: this encouragement, really, because she knows what she's doing.
Speaker: But she has so much to offer in giving this encouragement.
Speaker: And she is the exact opposite of the stabby in the back just to get a head tight person, which I have encountered in the publishing world.
Speaker: And that...
Speaker: It says something when I am more surprised when I have a bad experience in publishing than I am surprised when something good happens.
Speaker: That says a lot about the community.
Speaker: Yeah, that's awesome.
Speaker: And I think just the humility of that is just so attractive to me, like of what you've talked about with your friend Amanda and with like what you're talking about at the theater.
Speaker: And I've been a part of those groups watching people
Speaker: and just being so excited for them to succeed.
Speaker: It's just, it's, it's so counter-cultural, but it's not counter-cultural in like an in-your-face-we're-defying-culture kind of way, which sometimes you need that, but like there's just a, just a simple counter-culturalness to that that just makes you be like, what's going on?
Speaker: This is an artist who's
Speaker: great at what they do, and that's not the most important thing to them, like everything else is.
Speaker: And that's what I aspire to be.
Speaker: I don't think I always achieved that.
Speaker: But I think just the humility piece, like that and other people in Christ all being more important than your craft and your own success, I feel like.
Speaker: I don't know.
Speaker: I just, I don't think you see that a whole lot in the artistic world because art becomes the most important thing and you achieving your art becomes the most important thing.
Speaker: And sometimes that just, I think, gives people tunnel vision and it just kind of becomes too important.
Speaker: It does.
Speaker: And I think that that is also where we see a lot of depression in artists is when it feels like, well, I've got to do this.
Speaker: I'm all by myself.
Speaker: I'm the only one doing this.
Speaker: I'm the only one who understands.
Speaker: And I don't.
Speaker: that whole I'm no one understands me thing that is tempting to me.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Because I can blame like times that I didn't succeed or didn't get the contract or didn't win the award.
Speaker: Well, they just don't understand me.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And
Speaker: That may be true, but that's not my problem.
Speaker: My job is just to make the best art I can and to be a good community member.
Speaker: And the best art I can is just to the glory of God and not worry so much about reviews, which are wonderful.
Speaker: Oh, it's hard not to worry.
Speaker: That's something that's nice about community.
Speaker: Sometimes I wish I would get the feedback, but I'm like, I'm glad that I'd never get a scathing review.
Speaker: Oh, they're terrible.
Speaker: Because I bet it sucks.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I got one from a trade publication.
Speaker: So something that bookstores read.
Speaker: It was one of the hardest hitting reviews.
Speaker: It was like getting punched in the gut three times because there were three bad hits on it.
Speaker: And it was the first one that came out.
Speaker: for the all-american.
Speaker: Um, and it, it's searchable.
Speaker: People can find it.
Speaker: If you really want to rage, read a review, you can read that one.
Speaker: But, um, it was demoralizing and I felt like, well, maybe this book isn't going to do as well as I'd hoped.
Speaker: Um,
Speaker: But then that same day, like an hour after I saw the review, the mail came.
Speaker: And in it was this little card from my Aunt Becky.
Speaker: And I thought it was like an invitation to a baby shower.
Speaker: But no, it was a letter of her telling me, I was reading this other book of yours.
Speaker: And these are the good things I see in your writing.
Speaker: And I'm so proud of you.
Speaker: And, you know, it was just, it was like dripping with encouragement.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And so I was like, well, I think I'm going to choose to listen to Aunt Becky today.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: No, no bookstores are going to get this letter, but that doesn't matter.
Speaker: What matters is that I refocus on what matters, whose opinion really matters.
Speaker: And it's going to be the people.
Speaker: that feel served and feel encouraged by the work and it's going to be the opinion that god has of me and he he will feel the same way about me whether i write anything again or not um he's he's going to be proud of me and um delight over me and so i don't need to strive as much yeah
Speaker: And also Team Aunt Becky, right?
Speaker: Like we all need those people, those people that we can rely on to be encouraging.
Speaker: And we need to be those people too.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: Is there any particular way that you see your Christian faith influencing what you write or the way that you write in...
Speaker: I don't know, a way that makes it different from how you think it might normally be done or just in a way where you're like, I wouldn't necessarily experience writing the same way or do it the same way without my faith.
Speaker: I think that without my faith, I could be a very pessimistic person, which is not comfortable for me to think about.
Speaker: I don't think that I would be as much of an idealistic person.
Speaker: Because I just don't, I don't think that I would see the hope in things.
Speaker: I don't know that I would be able to see good in the midst of some really terrible situations.
Speaker: And so my hope is what, or my faith is what I come back to in order to fuel that, that way of seeing the world.
Speaker: And I think that if I didn't have my faith, I would probably write a little more jaded than I do.
Speaker: And I mean, I don't write happy endings.
Speaker: It's not all tied up in a tight little bow.
Speaker: But no matter what I write, it's infused with hope.
Speaker: And there's always redemption.
Speaker: I don't mean that someone is on their knees professing Christ.
Speaker: Is it really a Christian book then if you don't have that altar call moment at the end, Susie?
Speaker: Can a book be a Christian book?
Speaker: If it has an altar call at the end, it's come to the Lord.
Speaker: So it's been safe.
Speaker: Actually, there are some people who that's what they want.
Speaker: Oh, yeah.
Speaker: And so they're really disappointed in what I write because my characters, there are some of them that are Christian and they're living their lives.
Speaker: Yep.
Speaker: And so I don't, I mean, I don't know.
Speaker: I can't do it.
Speaker: I can't write those.
Speaker: No, that's fine.
Speaker: It's so hard.
Speaker: I have...
Speaker: Our friend Tim had to write a version of Christmas Carol with an altar call in it.
Speaker: And I'm just because he was mandated to do it.
Speaker: And it just, I don't know.
Speaker: Charles Dickens would not be pleased.
Speaker: No.
Speaker: No.
Speaker: No.
Speaker: Anyways, what were we saying before that?
Speaker: Redemption.
Speaker: Yeah, redemption.
Speaker: So, you know, God redeems them in the midst of sorrow or in the midst of falling apart.
Speaker: I just can't, I cannot reconcile
Speaker: being a Christian and not having some hope in whatever I write.
Speaker: So even if someday I write for the general market, which a lot of people in the Christian world call the secular market.
Speaker: I've noticed you not using that word.
Speaker: And I'm not, no, no, no.
Speaker: Cause that's, that's a key.
Speaker: Um, so if I ever do have the opportunity to write for the general market, which I'm open to editors, um, there would still be that piece of hope in it.
Speaker: Um,
Speaker: And I know that there are ways to do that.
Speaker: I know that there are ways to write about Christian characters in the general market without it becoming, you must do this and this and this to become a Christian.
Speaker: Because what I want in what I write, I want it to be
Speaker: presenting life to people.
Speaker: So number one, they won't feel so alone.
Speaker: Because I think so often people do feel alone in their struggles.
Speaker: But also there's hope and there is a greater good that is outside of us.
Speaker: And I have a lot of readers who don't ever read Christian fiction, who read my books, and I am so grateful for that.
Speaker: That's cool.
Speaker: Do you have like a favorite book that you've written of yours?
Speaker: Is there one that you're like, I know they're all your babies.
Speaker: Nope, they're not my babies.
Speaker: I have a whole, no, they're not my babies.
Speaker: They're work that I've done because if I, if I do the whole, it's my baby, it's to attach to who I am.
Speaker: And if mean people said mean things about my baby online, I would find them.
Speaker: That's fair.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: But because of my own self-esteem, I have to detach in a way.
Speaker: I get that.
Speaker: I had to do that with Hamlet for different reasons, but I was just like, there's so much going on here.
Speaker: You shouldn't link yourself too much to your art all the time.
Speaker: No.
Speaker: You know, I really, every single one of them has a very special piece of it to me.
Speaker: I think I will say, can I choose to?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: So All Manner of Things is really special to me mostly because it helped me understand my parents more because it was set in a time when they were teenagers.
Speaker: Mm-hmm.
Speaker: And they were both really a big part of me writing that book because they were giving me all this information.
Speaker: My dad wrote a memoir of his time in Vietnam for me for researching that book.
Speaker: So that one's special in that regard.
Speaker: Also, it won the most awards.
Speaker: There you go.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: Not that awards matter.
Speaker: They don't matter.
Speaker: But they do.
Speaker: But if a book gets a lot of rewards, rewards, awards, you should move it up on your list of likes.
Speaker: I think you kind of have to.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Right?
Speaker: And then the All-American, just because the characters, they became so dear to me.
Speaker: And I had, instead of one year, I usually have to write a novel.
Speaker: I had two.
Speaker: That is nice.
Speaker: It makes a big difference.
Speaker: Because, yeah, I mean, I've been drafting this fantasy novel, and I can't imagine trying to cram it all into...
Speaker: One year because it just takes time to learn the characters and know who they are and what they're doing and all that.
Speaker: Yeah, I have friends who write five books a year.
Speaker: Full length novels.
Speaker: How does that work?
Speaker: I don't know.
Speaker: I don't know.
Speaker: And I'm too afraid to ask.
Speaker: It's craziness.
Speaker: Like Brandon Sanderson, who was like, in COVID, I wrote 11 books or whatever, and I'm going to drop them all now.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Whatever Brandon Sanderson.
Speaker: Hey, you should put like tag him in this because we talked about him.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Oh, that would be fun.
Speaker: I have technically two more questions for you.
Speaker: But one more before the last question.
Speaker: I...
Speaker: Definitely feel like when you're working on a piece of art as an artist, God is working in you.
Speaker: Like he's just perfect at timing and aligning the things that you're doing with what he needs to get done.
Speaker: Um,
Speaker: Are there any memorable moments or books or projects that you were working on something and God was also very clearly working in you through the work that you were doing?
Speaker: Like something about the art was ministering to you as you made it?
Speaker: I have many moments, but I think the one that is most concrete in my mind, it was my second novel, and I was writing from a place of deep grief.
Speaker: I was with my husband's grandma when she passed away, and I was the one
Speaker: telling her, talking her through it, which is both a privilege and very traumatizing.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So I was, I thought I was doing okay because, you know, after someone dies, you get the adrenaline rush and you just power through the funeral and all of these things.
Speaker: And I was, I was at the funeral and I was like, oh, maybe I'll write a book about funeral directors.
Speaker: That would be an interesting book to write.
Speaker: And, um, and so I was, I was researching it and I was doing fine.
Speaker: And then months later, I opened a box from her house and it smelled like her and it just,
Speaker: everything came out like it was just really really hard and in my writers group at the time they were calling me sad Susie because everything I wrote was terribly sad about death and like this big old burly guy named Trevor would cry every time I'm sorry Trevor so I was I was processing my grief
Speaker: through that book and the there was one part of it and I told my husband because my kids were toddlers they weren't even in school as I was writing this this one and so I was like you've got it I told my husband you've got to take the kids away for four hours because I can't write this when anyone's home because I'll scare you all yeah and
Speaker: And just processing my grief through that one particular scene, it really, it made me see death in a different way.
Speaker: And...
Speaker: see that there is it sounds weird but there's beauty in death there can be and just the hope that we have as people who follow christ and who who have that longing for a home we've never known as c.s lewis talks about
Speaker: Um, I think that that, that gave me such a different perspective and really, um, I could not have written all of that just by myself.
Speaker: It's, it's kind of a, um, I think it was Norman Mailer called it the spooky art is writing.
Speaker: Cause there are times when you write something and you look back at it later and you're like, I
Speaker: did I write that?
Speaker: And I feel like that's when the Holy Spirit takes over speaking for us when all we have are grumbles and moans and sobs.
Speaker: And I've learned that there are some times when writing is a deep and active prayer activity for me.
Speaker: And just a way to worship and worship
Speaker: You know, sometimes we just think I'm just sitting here by myself, clicking away, making up these lies.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: It's a callback.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Making up these lies.
Speaker: But really what we're doing is we are deepening our understanding of the way that God can work through us.
Speaker: And I see that when we were...
Speaker: In Hamlet, there were certain scenes.
Speaker: I didn't get any of these scenes.
Speaker: But scenes where it was like a character coming to a different understanding.
Speaker: Especially like your last few handful of lines.
Speaker: Just...
Speaker: You know, tell my story and this is over and the rest is peace.
Speaker: It's silence.
Speaker: This all doesn't matter when it comes to eternity and Christ.
Speaker: And I never got to see that scene because I was dead.
Speaker: I know.
Speaker: I raised my hand up and reached towards heaven.
Speaker: Yeah, it's probably good I didn't look for any other performance because I would have been like a dead person going, oh no!
Speaker: Oh!
Speaker: Oh, that's awesome.
Speaker: So my last question that I ask all my guests, because part of what I'm hoping to do with this podcast is be able to build a resource for people in the Grand Rapids area to be able to deepen themselves artistically and spiritually.
Speaker: What is one or a couple resources that you would recommend to people
Speaker: to Christians who are wanting to grow either in their art or in their faith?
Speaker: And then since you're a writer, maybe who might be interested in writing and trying to think of a place to start with that?
Speaker: Well, okay.
Speaker: So if there are people who want to write,
Speaker: In the Grand Rapids area, I'm trying to think that there aren't really any writers' conferences anymore, and that's really sad to me.
Speaker: But they can Google writers' conferences and see what they can find.
Speaker: Oh, gosh.
Speaker: It is hard because the resources, like the communities are there, but to find them is hard.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: You know, the Stray, the coffee shop down the road, they have these storyteller nights.
Speaker: And that is a good way if you just go and you get to hear people tell stories.
Speaker: It's a good way to connect with other storytellers in the community.
Speaker: And those nights are...
Speaker: A little bit of everything.
Speaker: Oh my goodness.
Speaker: I got to be involved in one.
Speaker: And it was like, we got stories about a kid like falling under a cow.
Speaker: We've got stories about crazy mission work, things, happenings, and then story about Salman Rushdie.
Speaker: That was me.
Speaker: um i well you know what one place that you i don't know this is really rambling i hope you edit it um the festival of faith and writing is um kind of a a conference it's a celebration of literature that pertains to faith and kelvin college puts it on okay and next year is the first time they're back since 2020.
Speaker: And we're all chomping at the bit to get back.
Speaker: And it's there that you're going to hear from writers like Gary D. Schmidt, who writes middle grade and YA books that are just absolutely beautiful.
Speaker: And this man is winning National Book Awards, and he is writing from a place of deep and glorious faith.
Speaker: He has just this...
Speaker: beautiful love for children and a desire for them to understand that they are loved and valuable.
Speaker: And so he's reaching kids that would never hear of Christ, but he's giving a message of just compassion and hope.
Speaker: So if people check out the Festival of Faith and Writing, they also have a Center for Faith and Writing there where you can access different resources.
Speaker: We have a Facebook page and they have events throughout the year for people to come and just be with other writers.
Speaker: And it's really great.
Speaker: And the online community is great too.
Speaker: So if people connect with me, I can help point them to writers of faith who are writing in the general market, writing in the Christian market, wherever they are.
Speaker: And yeah,
Speaker: And you can read their books.
Speaker: And the best way to connect with authors is to read their books and then just send them an email saying, hey, I appreciated this about your book.
Speaker: Instead of being like, hey, I'm a writer, blah, blah, blah.
Speaker: Just making that introduction.
Speaker: I read this book.
Speaker: It meant something to me.
Speaker: And then maybe I hope someday to write something that will encourage someone.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And usually these writers are very, very happy to just start a little conversation.
Speaker: And coming to it with this mentality of I want to have a relationship with another writer means a lot more than I'm coming to this as a writer looking for someone to help me get published.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: Because I will tell you, published authors aren't sure how they're going to get their next book published, let alone how to get your book published.
Speaker: But those are great ways to do it.
Speaker: And start a writer's group.
Speaker: Find a couple people that write.
Speaker: that have, you know, same goals as you do and maybe discuss what you want the group to be.
Speaker: Is it critiquing?
Speaker: Is it just encouraging?
Speaker: And then inviting people in and building those relationships because we can't do this by ourselves.
Speaker: It's, it is too, too,
Speaker: It's demoralizing if you do.
Speaker: It is hard work.
Speaker: When I was at the conference in Portland, there was a guy who works for the Upper Room devotionals.
Speaker: He's an editor.
Speaker: And he said that he has dug ditches.
Speaker: Writing's harder.
Speaker: And I'm like, yes, it is.
Speaker: Digging a ditch, you're done.
Speaker: Nobody critiques it.
Speaker: And if they do, you're like, go dig some more, you know, but with writing, it's, it is more solitary and there's more, you're opening yourself up, you're being vulnerable.
Speaker: So you need to find other people who are life-giving, not people who are going to critique you necessarily, but people that are going to keep you going.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: That's awesome.
Speaker: Thank you for coming onto the podcast today.
Speaker: This has been a super cool discussion.
Speaker: If people want to find out more about you, where can they go?
Speaker: They can find me on Facebook.
Speaker: I'm there more than I should be.
Speaker: Same.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Instagram is where I post pictures of the books I've read and my cat.
Speaker: There you go.
Speaker: So if you like my cat.
Speaker: That's quality content.
Speaker: Books and cats.
Speaker: And Flannery thinks she is the most quality of all content.
Speaker: And if you just... I'm on TikTok, but I don't know what I'm doing.
Speaker: So maybe not TikTok and Goodreads.
Speaker: I read a lot, so I post about what I've read there.
Speaker: Cool.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Those are good ways.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Awesome.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Sweet.
Speaker: Thank you again for coming on.
Speaker: Thank you.
Speaker: Um, if you guys liked this episode, go check out Susie.
Speaker: She's got that novella coming out.
Speaker: Um, and she's just a wonderful person, great artistic soul.
Speaker: So go check her out.
Speaker: Um, again, share the podcast, leave a review.
Speaker: If you liked it, let us, uh, know how we're doing.
Speaker: Give us feedback.
Speaker: Um,
Speaker: Give us ideas if there's some topics or people you want to see us take a look at and we will see you guys next week.
Speaker: Pray God blesses you all as you continue just walking down this journey with Christ and as artists.
