Trevor Donovan In Love Finds You In Charm, Sunday

Update: Evidently, Love Finds You In Charm was chosen as a TV pick for the week in The New York Times. 

I’m posting this now because I never really know whether or not I’ll post on weekends. I usually do. But this time of year I never know for sure.

Here’s all you need to know, plain and simple:

Who: Trevor Donovan stars in Love Finds You In Charm

What: Love Finds You In Charm is an Amish Romance, based on a best selling 2009 novel.

When: It airs this Sunday, beginning at 7 pm, NY time. I also noticed while setting my DVR that they will air it again at 9 pm, and a few times after that. So you’ll get several chances to see it…or binge on it.

Where: It’s airing on the UP channel. I’m not sure of all the market shares, but in the Philadelphia market, if you have Verizon Fios, it’s channel 224. I’m sure if you do a simple search you’ll be able to find it online as well.

I read the book a while ago and I found it a great escape with a nice love story, in a great setting. I think it’s something that crosses romance genres and all romance readers will enjoy it…think along the lines of Debbie Macomber, but Amish. 

Here’s a trailer where Donovan performs a song, Fields of Gold, he wrote for the film. He’s been getting a lot of attention for this on social media from all over the globe, and rightly so. 

Should You Create Audio Books

I don’t have links to this part of the post. It’s only my opinion/advice. You can take it for what it’s worth, one way or the other. And like all advice, this isn’t set in stone. There are always variables and everyone’s experience is a little different. 

With that said, I glanced at a discussion yesterday on social media where an author was talking about producing his/her own audio books. It was a good discussion, but I noticed one thing missing. Reality.

A handful of people commented positively about audio books. They raved at the thought of the author spending his/her own money to produce them. However, it was a handful of people, not over one thousand…not even in the hundreds. And for an author to make it worth his/her time he/she has to have the kind of large readership that’s willing to spend the money on an audio book.

I love audio books. I have a few out there that were produced by Ravenous Romance. One in particular was An Officer and His Gentleman. The audio book sold well, but by no means as well as the book itself sold, and by no means well enough to create more audio books with other titles. This was the publisher’s decision, not mine, but I agreed with them completely. But even more important, audio books like An Officer and His Gentleman are pirated all the time. I obviously won’t provide a link to show you, but that’s just another factor in producing audio books you have to consider nowadays. And piracy is getting worse, not better.

A writer/author has to think like a businessperson now more than ever, and they have to be prudent as well. Even though it’s nice to have 75 or 80 people with good intentions tell you how much they’d love to see all your books produced as audio books, you have to take into consideration that you need to have a readership in the thousands to make it worth your while. That’s why you don’t see all publishers producing audio books for all authors and all titles. It’s not because they don’t want to produce audio books, it’s because that large market just isn’t there all the time. Yes, there are exceptions to the rule, however you really have to know your readership before you invest the time and money in getting into audio book production.  

Caitlyn Jenner’s Critics

I knew this would happen sooner or later. I didn’t mention it in any posts, but I’ve been waiting for it. Now that Bruce Jenner made the full transition to Caitlyn Jenner, the critics have started to surface. I’m not going to post the most ridiculous things I’ve seen in the mainstream, but this is interesting. Jenner is not getting the kind of support you would expect from the transgender community.

I overwhelmingly support Caitlyn Jenner and am happy for her as she now gets to live her authentic life. One of the things her story highlights is that everybody’s transition is unique — no two people are alike, and every person faces different challenges in their own context. 

The reality is, Caitlyn’s story is unique because she is coming from a tremendous amount of privilege.
Not everybody can make a coming out statement to Diane Sawyer or be on the cover of Vanity Fair and have a reality show in the works. But it’s wonderful there are people who use their celebrity to advance a message to help others. 

You can read the rest here. It’s not a totally negative piece, and I’d like that to be clear. However, there are a few left-handed comments, so to speak. On the other hand, as it states, it brings the topic out in the open for debate.  And we all still have a great deal to learn about it. I’ve been fortunate to know more than a few trans people who live and work here in New Hope, PA and even I’m still learning.

And, here’s a link to another one titled, Caitlyn Jenner Is Not the Right Poster Girl For Trans Equality. 

Pastor Slams Gay Grads

Another good Christian is speaking out with anti-gay comments, and this time it’s yet another pastor.

While delivering a baccalaureate service to a class of high school seniors, Pastor Scott Carpenter (pictured) thought it would be an opportune time to remind any gay graduates in the audience that they were going to burn in hell.

The hate speech happened on May 30 at Kings Mountain High School in Kings Mountain, NC and, naturally, left quite a few people upset.

The rest is here. The school wasn’t too thrilled with this guy and they claim they will be vetting speakers more carefully next time.

I wonder what this pastor thinks of the Duggar debacle.