Message from Marion

Dear Visitor,

We writers tend to think of our books as children we have birthed. That makes my latest—Naked on God’s Doorstep: A Memoir— number nineteen.

For years, I collected snippets of memories—like the time I sat on Daddy’s lap, puzzled because he slipped into a catatonic state. Sunny winter days sitting on a Coney Island boardwalk bench, the crowds absent, as Mama and I watched the surf crash on the shore. Giant gospel billboards at subway stations that quoted Bible passages like religious fingers shaking in my face. The Incher stories that my husband, whose whimsy was only a chuckle away, told our children. When the time was right, I spent nearly a year weaving them together.

Until recently, I didn’t realize that the theme of nearly all my books has been relationships.  In my first, The Greening of Mrs. Duckworth, a series of verbal snapshots, I described my journey into God’s welcoming arms. The Strong Place detailed the miraculous Vine-branch relationship in which I was learning to live. After I began to develop a healthy sense of  personhood because  I was God’s beloved daughter, I wrote Becoming Complete.

 Publishers requested that I write When Your Child Becomes Your Friend, book-child number four, as well as my twins—Families of Handicapped Childrenand Substance Abuse.  When I learned that youth were committing suicide at an alarming rate, I wrote Why Teens are Killing Themselves: And What We Can Do About It

At conferences and in my home women confessed that they felt empty and isolated. So I wrote Healing for the Empty Heart. In Celebrate Who You Are, Renewed on the Runand Pure Passion, inductive Bible studies, I led women on a discovery of their personal identity, spiritual renewal and the marital relationship.

Now that I was becoming a more confident Christian woman, I wanted to figure out how to make my own moral choices in today’s tough world. The Decisive Woman describes five key principles. Then, just for fun, I wrote BJ Grows Up about an oversized, floppy puppy who, like his little boy best friend, must grow up and assume responsibility.

Along the way, I birthed quintuplets to be used for Christian education. But I confess that my first novel, Remembering the Roses, was a favorite. I’ve never admitted it until now, because I didn’t want my other paper kids to be jealous.

For several years, I didn’t write because I was caring for my invalid husband. A couple of years after he died, I began work on Naked on God’s Doorstep. I experienced a lot of labor pains in the birthing of this book.  That’s because it’s a memoir, so I had to dig deep.

In the work I have produced over two decades, I have cried loudly and consistently that the importance of relationship is immeasurable. Without it, life is sterile and meaningless.

Once, at a retreat where I was speaking, I asked people to imagine what it would be like if we humans existed side by side, aware of one another but unable to initiate recognition or to communicate.

“Imagine that we were destined to live together in silent separation, milling about, alone forever.” I urged them. “Perhaps even worse,  imagine that God refused to acknowledge our existence and remained cold, detached and aloof. 

Instead of alienating us, God has extended an eternal embrace. Whoever we are and however our lives have unfolded, that gives life meaning.

You can obtain Naked on God’s Doorstep by clicking the link on this website.

Many of my other books you’ll find at Amazon.com.  

Blessings,
Marion