I've been in touch with Elaine Stock since being introduced to her book, Always With You. It was such a poignant tale which stands out in my mind, even several months after reading it. It brought forth a reaction from me that I may never forget; it even ended up with the honor of being featured here at Budden Book Reviews. (See book title link above)

In March of 2017,  one of my books, If Only, had the privilege of being featured on her blog, Everyone's Story. Due to the nature of the various comments left by Elaine's blog visitors, it was impossible not to reflect a little about my own life as well.

Advance the calendar to November of 2017, I was honored to appear on Everyone's Story again, this time in the form of an interview. I had the opportunity to showcase a couple of my books because of the responses to her various questions.

Now, at last, it's my pleasure to host Elaine Stock, the author, at Budden Book Reviews and I thoroughly look forward to introducing you to this wonderful Christian lady who enjoys life, thrives on writing stories from her heart and who isn't afraid to ask a question when she wants to know the answer.

Without further ado, I now present to you one author who has become a dear friend over the past year - one of the most beautiful friendships 2017 brought into my life.

Antonio Vivaldi wrote the well-known classical composition: the Four Seasons: spring, summer, autumn, winter. M*A*S*H star Alan Alda directed, wrote and starred in, along with Carol Burnett, the 1981 movie, The Four Seasons, giving visual image to three couples who vacation with each other during each annual season and share the different joys and crises in life. And, Stephen King penned the novella collection, Different Seasons, which group four stories connected by the changing seasons with the theme of character journey.

Whether one lives in Florida and enjoys milder climatic seasons compared to my northeast of four distinct seasons, or if one lives in Australia and experiences seasons opposite of the United States and Europe, we all meet up and undergo different life seasons. Some of these times are wonderful: graduating high school and entering college, marriage, children and grandkids, a job promotion . . . even as big as winning a cruise or as little as hearing from a long-lost friend on social media. Yet, there are times of overcoming challenges: a chronic illness, the loss of a loved one (whether from intended estrangement or death) or any countless scenarios. I don’t have to tell you. You’re already familiar with the different seasons of life. In fact, fiction, whether novel or movie or theatre, would be deemed “unrealistic” and “boring” if the central characters had a nice life free of obstacles and outright hardships during the various seasons of their lives.

As an author, I’m pulled by the physical change of season. Grant you, all I have to do is to glance out my upstate New York living room windows and see the brilliant colors of the trees in late September and early October. I drive down roads in mid-October on wide-eyed alert for deer because it’s their mating season. In November I put on the snow tires, aware I’ll soon be crunching snow as I walk to the driveway to shovel off the white accumulation on my car while slapping my gloved-hands and stomping my booted feet to remind my body to circulate heat. In spring I’ll dress in layers, ready to peel off the added sweater or change into short-sleeves as the day heats up. In the summer I’ll remind myself not to gripe about the high temps and humidity because in a short few months I’ll be missing those days! That’s the physical. And my life-seasons? Of family issues that I never saw advancing like a hidden army? Of a change of jobs after twelve years of what felt like “settled” but turned like a political snap of a finger with a change in company direction? Or, can I dare be bold to say, of aging and dealing with disobedient body parts?

In 2016 I was blessed, truly blessed, to see my first novel, Always With You, published, and become a 2017 Christian Small Publisher Association Book of the Year Winner. My novella, And You Came Along, was first released on November 7^th as part of the collection, Winter’s Kiss, and then independently December 2^nd. January, 2018 will bring the release of another full-length novel, Her Good Girl. Even now, as an author, I’m entering another season of life, trusting God to carry me through this next season of a writer’s journey to write and publish the stories I believe with my whole heart that He wants me to write. I can only pray that readers will agree. Unsure of the future, let alone the near future, I move forward.

I have to.

I have no other choice but to move ahead into what I can only hope is another spring season of life - a milder and enjoyable season of new beginnings, of blossoming. Spring offers promise. Yet, as a seasoned New Yorker, I know to get from fall to spring I must don the winter coat and not necessarily hunker down but muster my courage and plod through the cold to arrive in the warmth.

I created the byline to my author name as “Fusing Romance, Family Drama, and Faith in a Clean Fiction Style.” In preparing for my upcoming releases, I just updated my Twitter and Facebook headers and added to the byline, “In All Seasons of Life.” My characters, Isabelle and Tyler, in Always With You, begin their journey by falling in love and marrying, while overlooking very real and dangerous consequences, during the autumn; learn of the joy of a baby on the way in the cold of winter; open their eyes to the scary truth of their situation in the spring; and fight for their lives and each other in the summer. In And You Came Along,  Jacey and Zander meet during a blizzard and question the rest of their lives—together—as they face both the season of spring, and step toward new beginnings they both had once never dreamed of encountering. Then, there is eighteen-year-old Sadie in Her Good Girl, a story that takes place during 5 days at the beginning of summer. Along the way of fighting for her future, away from her broken family, she discovers the way out may be an escape to something deeper, and worse, by the hands of someone else.

Weather-wise, I enjoy experiencing the feel of the four seasons, although I admit I wish winters here in the northeast were far shorter. Like, one week. I don’t think I’m being unreasonable! As for the various seasons of life, practicality and realism rule, regardless of my two cents. There will be pluses and minuses in this thing called life. I must soldier on. In faith, I hold His hand and continue.

 And you?

You can find Elaine in several places across the web. 

Visit her at her blog, website, Facebook, Twitter, Goodreads & Amazon.

What's your favorite season of the year, and why?