A Note From Emma

Thank you so much for reading! I always like to leave a personal note at the end of every book as a tiny reward for readers. This is where I pull back the curtain a bit and get real.

There are usually a handful of details or stories in each book that come from my own life, with varying degrees of accuracy. Here are a few from this book:

On a more serious note, I was a little nervous about this book. I typically am pretty light on faith in my books. There are a few reasons for that, but the main one is that I think it’s VERY hard to write realistic faith. It’s not pretty. It’s often hard. Christian people disagree with each other on a lot of small points and I’ve seen some incredibly harsh reviews from people who say they are Christians.

Though sweet romance books have a happy-ever-after on the page, we all know that there is more to the story. Five minutes later, they might have a huge fight. But that wouldn’t be satisfying to readers on the page!

In the same way, our faith journeys are just that. The only happy ending is heaven, so while we’re here, there are ups and downs and hard times and good times. We mess up. We doubt. We drift. I think in writing a book with a happy ending that was ALSO a book about faith, I worried that I couldn’t write real, gritty, hard, wonderful, amazing faith.

Truth be told, I probably can’t! I do hope that the characters did grow and wrestle with faith in a realistic way. Yes, there’s a happy ending. But no, there isn’t really a tidy bow. It’s a JOURNEY.

Sterling had a journey and Reese had a journey. (Moby and Staci too!) If you could hang out with them after the pages of this book, I’d like to think they are still struggling through it. Some days it’s easier than others and maybe there are some really hard times for them. Just like it is for me.

Thank you again for reading! I really do value my readers. If you ever want to drop me a line, here’s my email. I USUALLY answer. [emailprotected]

I also have a reader’s group if you want to hang out on Facebook: http://emmastclair.com/readergroup

And an email list where I send weekly clean reads for you AND give you a free book: http://emmastclair.com/freebook