Kristen Stieffel
Handel’s Messiah: Kind of a Bore
Am I allowed to say that? We’re all familiar, I think, with the “Halleluiah Chorus,” which is no doubt one of the most beautiful pieces of music ever written. But there’s a reason it’s usually the one part of Messiah that gets sung. And the reason is that the rest of the program is dull […]
My Favorite Thanksgiving Recipe
I know not all of our readers are in the U.S., but I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving Day, if that’s a thing where you are. Now that I’m single again, and with my son living in another state, it was a pretty quiet day for me, and I did more work than […]
Why Negative Reviews are Good
A negative review is not bad. A bad review is when someone gives one star on Amazon and says, “I don’t know if I like this book. I haven’t read it yet.” That calls for reporting, except I’m not sure it helps to report someone who’s not clever enough to figure out that when Amazon […]
Why I’m a Feminist
Those who’ve read Alara’s Call know it is fundamentally about equality. And when I discuss the subject, I do try to keep the focus on equality, because for too many people feminism is a red flag. They think it means anti-male. But honest feminism is not about pulling men down. That’s misandry. Feminism is about […]
Alara’s Marcher Lord Roots
What can I tell you NAF followers about Alara’s Call that I haven’t already? Some of you have been with me on this journey since the days of the Marcher Lord Select contest. When we announced the release date for Alara’s Call, Becky Minor—NAF alumn and founder of the Realm Makers conference—asked me if that […]
Irma is Not God’s Punishment
This happens every time a major disaster happens. Some crank — sometimes a more high-profile crank than others — claims that the disaster is God’s “punishment” for some perceived infraction on the part of whoever’s getting slammed at the moment. Pat Robertson once denounced my home city of Orlando because of Walt Disney World’s acceptance […]
Conference Notes: Realm Makers 2017 Keynote
Y’all forgive me if this is discombobulated; I was typing as fast as I could, but Ted Dekker shared so much … I’m afraid this is just a taste and may not connect all the dots. But I wanted you to have an idea of how awesome this talk was. Most of this is not […]
Cover reveal: Alara’s Call
Some of you have been with me on this long, long publishing journey ever since the founding of NAF back in 2010. At that point, I’d already been shopping Alara’s Call for several years. I’ve already written several posts about the process of getting Alara’s Call published. Now I have a new publisher, Love2ReadLove2Write Publishing, […]
The New Authors Fellowship 