Love the Wounded -- Lynn Dove

I suppose it was only fitting that I wrote the last chapter of my book, "Love the Wounded" on Valentine's Day.  I suppose that had to be a "God thing". It was the last book in the "Wounded Trilogy".

As I punched out the last few lines and pressed the "saved" button, I just slumped in my chair and whispered "Done!" My husband and kids were long since in bed, but I was on a roll and just couldn't stop the flow of words. I was so close to finishing, so I plugged on and that's why at just before midnight I celebrated quietly alone in the dark by my keyboard after I had typed the last word of my story. I guess after such a long labour, pouring my heart into a project that started with my first book in the "Wounded" series nearly four years ago, to the completion of the manuscript for the final book, I couldn't help feeling a bit contemplative about it all.

God led me on this writing journey and to tell the honest truth I had no idea then how many curves in the road there would be and what varied adventures waited for me around every corner.

My writer's life has been for the most part a solitary one. It's basically me parked in front of a computer screen, tapping out a plotline that is only imagined in my mind and then brought to "life" on paper. It's a weird process really. It's even more weird when I consider all the other bizarre imagery and thoughts also rattling around in my head at the same time that I could have just as easily regurgitated to life and then instantly regretted. Silly, stupid, and basically messed up things that really should NEVER be put to paper. Fire yes,...paper...no!

James 3:1 says that "not many of you should presume to be teachers, my brothers, because you know that we who teach will be judged more strictly."

I dare say that a writer in many ways is a teacher, especially those of us who are called by God to write. Our words may teach, empower, embolden, condemn, accuse, uplift, benefit and reprimand. Look at history. Mein Kampf caused an entire nation to embrace the ideology of a madman. The book, 1984 by George Orwell coined the phrase "Big Brother is watching you." - a phrase that takes on new meaning today in this world of interconnectedness on the internet. The word "Twilight" will no longer be just a time in the day to sit and watch the sun go down, but now will be forever associated with vampires and werewolves. Even a simple journal, found after a young girl's death, has become a symbol of racial persecution, something the young Anne Frank likely never would have imagined as she wrote her private thoughts into her diary.

Books have the ability to change lives, change history, change the world. It is no wonder that when we writers put pen to paper, or in this day and age, PDF's to Kindle, we must be constantly aware that we will be held accountable one day for what we write.

Now I would be incredibly egotistical to think that my little books will someday "change the world"...Whoa! Still, whenever one person picks up and reads one of my books, whatever I have written will likely elicit a response...good, bad or indifferent in that person. No doubt when I look at my reviews later I will be able to determine what the ultimate response has been...heeheehee :)

So as I "birth" another book I hope you will allow me the artistic license this one time to change the wording in James slightly to keep me ever mindful as a writer Whose I am:

"Not many of you should presume to be (writers),...because you know that we who (write) will be judged more strictly."