Dernier Publishing Newsletter October 2017
Once again we have reached autumn and harvest time – how time flies, along with the swallows! Hope you have had a good summer.
Last weekend I went to stay with my brother, who moved to Ireland last year. It was my first time on Irish soil – what a beautiful country! One day we drove to the Atlantic coast. It was a windy day, and wow, how those waves were rolling in! But it was the pebbles on the beach that took my attention: they were all different sorts – really unusual. It reminded me how, although we are all so very different, with different gifts and from different walks of life, we are all in the kingdom of God together.
Some of the pebbles were so incredibly smooth, too! Rubbed up against each other, smashed by the waves and eroded by the rough sand day after day, the process is smoothing every sharp and rough corner. There’s a lesson there. If we are feeling battered by life, and bruised by people . . . we can rejoice! All those hardships are there to help us become more like Jesus.
I kept this one to remind me.
Paul learns a bit about that in the Revenge of the Flying Carpet, but more about that in a minute!
Book Parties
Please let me know if you’re interested in having a Dernier book party between now and Christmas. It’s a great way to get Christian books into more homes and earn some commission at the same time! I can email you all the details – just reply to this email or contact me here.
Lambeth Palace
Because of our links with Angel Tree, I was privileged to be invited to Lambeth Palace to an event organised by the Prison Fellowship. What an amazing work they do. Listening to the speakers and talking to a chaplain from a Young Offenders Institution afterwards, I came away more aware than ever how vital it is we reach our children with the good news of Jesus while they are young. There are too many heartbreaking stories – some of the boys in the YOI are as young as fifteen. 🙁 You can read more about the Prison Fellowship and Angel Tree here.
Please pray for the children of prisoners who will receive our books this year through Angel Tree. Many of them are vulnerable themselves. And do buy books for children you care for – you may never know what misery you might avert by the seeds you sow.
Audio and Ebooks
Please keep praying for our audio books and ebooks, too! A lot of work is going into each file. Ebook files will be uploaded to the CLC website very soon. As soon as they are available I will let you know, of course. Nearly there!
I’ve just finished recording Living in Hope for the Torch Trust for blind and partially sighted people. I Want to Be An Airline Pilot is done; Under the Tamarind Tree is next, so people with sight loss can have the whole set of Rwanda books on audio. Reading into the microphone is not as easy as it might seem, and re-recording the bits when I stumble or get a word wrong is time-consuming. But slowly we’re getting there . . .
CRT
Thanks to all who prayed for our time at the Christian Resources Together retreat last month. It was a great time of meeting up with friends in the trade, and supporting each other, so together we can get as many Christian resources out into the church (and the world!) as we can. It was especially lovely for me to have author Eleanor Watkins helping on our exhibition stand. Thanks Eleanor! Our authors are such a vital part of the publishing process, and are greatly valued. Eleanor and I gave away copies of Rebecca and Jade: Choices to retailers from Christian bookshops. We hope many will read it and recommend it to customers.
Revenge of the Flying Carpet
Special Offer
Copies will be with us any time now from the printer! I can’t wait to see them. The cover will have varnish swirls, which you can’t see in the jpg image. The release date for this book is 1st November, but I have a special offer for you (as you are kind enough to be subscribed to this mailing list). If you pre-order Revenge of the Flying Carpet between now and the launch date, I will send you, completely free, a copy of Deepest Darkness along with the new book, to pass on to a child on your heart. If you would be kind enough to write a review on our website when you have read it, I would be hugely grateful. The review can be as simple as ‘This was a good/bad book‘ or ‘I loved it/hated it‘ – you can write as much as you like, of course! We all look for reviews when we want to buy something, so the more reviews, the merrier. (This offer is exclusive to supporters on our mailing list, though, so please don’t pass it around.)
This is the link to our website. When you order, let me know you are a subscriber, and I’ll make sure your copy of Deepest Darkness goes into your parcel. This offer is only available pre-launch, so don’t delay, order now.
Revenge of the Flying Carpet will be available from your local Christian bookshop, of course, as well as from our website.
About the Book
Some of you know I started Dernier Publishing when I saw the need for fun fiction for young people written from a Christian perspective. (That’s cutting a long story short, but it will do for now!) I began writing stories myself, so I had something to publish in those early years when I had no money and no experience (and didn’t want to be responsible for ruining anyone else’s stories while on that steep learning curve!). Actually, I found I loved writing fiction, but as Dernier has got bigger I’ve had little time for writing, as I’ve concentrated on publishing other people’s stories.
However, a few years ago I had an idea for a story that was burning in me. I began writing Revenge of the Flying Carpet – and actually finished it. We all know children who are bullied and badly treated at home and at school. Knife and gun crime are on the increase. Gangs bring violence because revenge is a way of life – and unless there’s forgiveness, there will never be and end to the suffering. It may be natural instinct to want to ‘get even’, but it doesn’t work – it just brings more pain to more people. Lives will carry on being scarred, hurt, torn apart. Children are not exempt.
I wanted to write a book that would bring hope to young people who suffer or who have suffered at the hands of other people. A charity we have links with runs trauma healing workshops for Christians in Nigeria who are victims of people who burn their villages, kill their families, kidnap their girls. Forgiveness is part of the healing process. Challenging? You bet.
In the Revenge of the Flying Carpet, Paul’s sister is mean to him – very mean. All the time. All his life he has had to put up with her mocking, bullying, mean nastiness. I wanted to show readers that although in this world there can be injustice, pain, abuse, oppression and all kinds of evil, one day there will be justice. And for now, there needs to be grace and forgiveness. We need to forgive, and we need to be forgiven. It’s then we find freedom. Paul finds this challenging, too, in the book, as he hears the good news of Jesus and starts to understand what it means. I pray the story will bring hope to anyone who has ever suffered at the hands of others, as well as being an enjoyable read! I hope it will help young people find forgiveness – forgiveness for themselves, for the wrongs they have done, and forgiveness for the people who have sinned against them. Or at least take a step in that direction.
I hope you will buy this book, read it yourself, then pass it on and buy more for the 10-14s in your life (you might even enjoy it yourself!).
And that’s all I have room for!
Grace and peace to you,
Janet
P.S. I used to be Evans before I was Wilson, so I’ve kept J.M. Evans as my pen name. Still me, though!