Anne Marie Miller

Category: Writing

  • a letter to my agent

    my book deadline is february 28 march 14.

    i sent this letter to my agent a few moments ago.

    Oh, my dear Beth.

    I’m sure you have a calendar for each of us. And on that calendar, with all of your experience, you probably have certain days circled in red. These days would represent days like today when I email you and say I am having looking-my-deadline-in-the-eye-induced-panic-attacks.

    Breathe in, breathe out.

    My brain has locked up. My fingers have locked up. And (breathe) I (breathe) have (breathe) two (breathe) weeks?

    I don’t know what agents do on these days. But you do.

    Please send xanax, stat.

    Sincerely yours,
    Anne-Going-To-Hide-Under-My-Bed-Jackson

    your role in this, bloggyfriends? pray…hard…for me! being sick/asleep twenty-one hours a day lately isn’t really helping my schedule.

  • info porn – don’t spread bad stats

    %“christians like info porn”

    one of my friends, who’s been working in research and statistics for the last decade or so, wrote that in an email to me.

    what led us to that conversation were some statistics many of us have seen before. i know i have, and i was hoping to use them in my book. but having been recently influenced by my brilliant stats-minded friend, i knew i had to track down the source and make sure it was indeed scientific and unbiased before claiming it gospel truth.

    the stats i was looking up:

    1500 ministers leave the ministry each month due to moral failure, burnout, or contention
    50% of pastors’ marriages will end in divorce
    80% feel unqualified and discouraged
    50% would leave ministry but fear they couldn?t make a living
    70% constantly fight depression
    40% have had an extramarital affair while in ministry
    70% say their only time reading the Bible is when they prepare sermons

    i looked around and was able to track most of them down to an informal survey focus on the family did. sounds legit, right?

    not so.

    the survey was conducted at seminars for pastors/marriages. something i’ve learned in the course of writing mad church disease is just because you have a group of people answer questions, well, that doesn’t make it real research.

    unfortunately, these stats cannot be considered accurate for a couple of reasons:

    -it’s not a representative sample. the group is pastors who went to a FOF event. totally idiosyncratic.
    -the wording of the questions are biased. and grouped. you can’t ask if they feel something AND something.

    it would be like getting a group of 20 and 30 year old pastors together and then saying a majority of pastors are young. that’s just not the way statistics are done.

    97% of christians get 80% of their stats from unreliable sources, and 73% of them will pass it on as truth. and yes, that whole sentence was a bunch of bull. christians like info porn!

    moral of the story? take a stand against info porn. don’t spread bad stats!

    on another note, i do have some scientific research that was conducted legitimately. and because i want you to wait a year and buy the book, i won’t put it up just yet… :)

    but please let me say…things are not as bad as they may seem.

  • What Causes Burnout?

    What do you think are some things that cause burnout in ministry – or in general?

  • exclusive preview of chapter 2 – mad church disease!

    thank you all for sharing your thoughts on yesterday’s question! did you know that by responding, you all were helping me research some stuff for mad church disease? you were! so thank you again, so so much!

    i’d like to take a moment to give you all an exclusive peek at chapter 2 as a token of my appreciation. enjoy! i’d love to get your thoughts…

    mcd

    yep. that’s it…sorry… i know. i suck. :)

  • catching some Z

    since i am still in my brain funk, i thought i’d share some good news with you guys before the holidays!

    as you know, the book i am working on, mad church disease, will be released in february 2009.

    i haven’t publicly (via blog) announced WHO the publisher is…

    but why not today?

    i am officially a zondervan author! woot!

    z

    the team there is amazing and they ooze creativity. they truly see this book as something that is needed in the church today! their excitement about the project keeps refueling my excitement about the project. i am so pumped to have such a strong partner for this adventure.

    i am also VERY grateful for my agent beth jusino from alive communications. without beth’s knowledge of the industry, her passion for young writers and fresh ideas, and her willingness to hand-hold a rookie author, i would probably be neck-deep in things i don’t understand.

    so those are a few things for which i am very thankful!!

    what are you thankful for?

  • how to write a book (1 of 1)

    i’ve gotten a lot of email lately asking me advice on how to write a book and get it published. well, here is a post dedicated just to that topic.

    the answer?

    i don’t know.

    but i’ll let you know as soon as i have it figured out :)

  • spoiled rotten & rambling

    it seems as most of my adult life, i’ve had a laptop, usually work-provided. the same was true with my current job, except i was extremely spoiled. i had an iMac desktop AND an HP laptop. but, as part of the focus of my position changed, the laptop was put to use in a more effective way (meaning its owner as of a few months ago was no longer yours truly.)

    first, i went through a freaking out period. i had no other computer at home except the laptop. my phone (which is back in working order, yay!) has microsoft word and email on it, but could i really write a book using those little letters on the keyboard?

    fortunately, a friend saw my need and let me borrow a mac mini (and another friend lent all the peripherals) so at least i had something at home until i got my big fat (realistic and very modest) book advance (which one must have a publisher in order to get) and with that advance (from currently up in the air publisher), a new laptop would be purchased.

    as fortunate as i am to have such generous friends, my mind is not being so generous with sharing its creativity with me. i realize how spoiled rotten i have become with mobility and technology…the fact i am confined to my little ikea chair (which after sitting on for any extended amount of time will lower slowly…slowly…until one is awkwardly low to the ground)…and the gentle whirring and humming of my borrowed CRT monitor has somehow convinced me that i need the mobility in order to be productive. that i cannot be in one spot all the time and be productive.

    which is a lie.

    but is still very hard for my personality to sit in one place…especially when the cats jump up on the keyboard and what was an intelligible sentence turns into someiopdufthing lik3897e thcjjlskis.

    all of this nonsensical rambling (which should have been put towards book-use) to ask for your prayers…i have a deadline in less than two weeks…i am struggling on a part of the proposal…my brain is fried…

  • anything with peppermint is good

    especially books written by my friend eric bryant. i’ve known eric for the last few years – back in the xanga days of 2004 even – but have never met him in person.

    anyway, this summer he released a phenomenal book titled, “peppermint-filled pinatas: breaking through tolerance and embracing love“ which if you have ever stepped one foot in mosaic LA, where he serves as a navigator, you are immediately embraced by such a sense of acceptance and love. then you get to know more and more people there, and see what they’re doing in the community, and in mexico, and in the world and you know this isn’t just some attempt to write a book – eric is living this.

    fortunately, they are shipping eric all the way down to the lone star state on monday (as well as some other places) and i will be taking off as soon as i can from my little third-floor office to trek to fort worth to finally meet eric. check out the dates below and if he’s going to be near you (fort worth’s a couple hours away with traffic so no excuses! if i can drive a little, so can you), go meet him, support him, and bring him some chocolate chip cookies.

    i don’t even know if he likes them, but it’d be a nice gesture. and if he didn’t, you could always eat them instead.

    July 20 – Alburquerque, NM – City on a Hill Church – 7pm Discussion and Book Signing | http://CityOnAHillabq.org/

    July 22 – Houston, TX – Ecclesia Church, 10:30am and 5:30pm – www.EcclesiaHouston.org

    July 23 – Fort Worth, TX – Barnes & Noble Bookstore Discussion and Book Signing at 7pm (1612 S. University Dr. #401, Fort Worth, TX 76107)

    July 25 – Waco, TX – Mardel’s Bookstore Discussion & Signing at 4pm (4324 West Waco Drive, Waco, TX 76710 PH: 254-399-9237)

    July 26 – Austin, TX – Mosaic Austin, 7:30pm Discussion and Book Signing + Music from Rob Lowe of Balmorhea | http://www.MosaicAustin.org/

    July 28 – San Antonio, TX – Wayside Chapel, 6pm | http://WaysideChapel.org/

    July 29 – San Antonio, TX – Wayside Chapel, 9:15am and 11am | http://WaysideChapel.org/

    July 31 – Phoenix, AZ – North Phoenix Baptist Church (event details & registration here)

    August 2 – Cleveland, OH – Cuyahoga Valley Church, 7-8:30pm | www.CuyahogaValleyChurch.com | event sponsored by Church of the Hills

  • Tell me what you want, what you really really want…

    First of all, thank you to everyone who has helped promote Mad Church Disease. I think we will cross the 1000 survey mark before tomorrow and it has only been a week since the site launched. This could NOT have been done without you.

    Anyway, I just finished my first outline for the book as part of the proposal going to some publishers. Before I finalize it, I want to make sure I’m not leaving out anything-as I’ve mentioned before – this isn’t just a book that I’m writing about what I think-I want to make sure that it is meeting as many needs that I am searching for as many answers as possible.

    So, if you have any thoughts on what you?d like to see in the book, now is your time!

    Let me know in the comments on the Mad Church Disease blog.

    Also…this would be a great opportunity to solicit feedback from YOUR readers. Many of them have completed surveys but I don’t want their participation to end there. If you feel so inclined, please take this time to email them, or to blog about this, and point them to the MCD blog as I’d love for them to continue contributing to the content of the book as well.

    I’m closing comments on this particular post in order to keep all the feedback on this topic over at the Mad Church Disease blog. I’ll see you over there — and remember — there are no stupid ideas!!

    If you are really thinking about something, ask!