LDS Podcast "Latter-Day Lights" - Inspirational LDS Stories

When Creative Dreams Face Rejection: Trusting God's Plan: Heather B. Moore's Story - Latter-Day Lights

• Scott Brandley and Darla Brandley

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How do you keep pursuing your dreams when rejection, discouragement, and life’s responsibilities seem to stand in the way?

In this week’s episode of Latter-day Lights, Scott and Darla Brandley sit down with U.S. Today’s bestselling author, Heather B. Moore, to hear how she built a full-time writing career through perseverance, prayer, and years of steady effort, despite the mountain of rejections as a new name to the publishing scene. Starting as a young mother who wrote her first manuscript at 30, Heather shares how critique groups and constant learning shaped her growth and prepared her for her first ever “pinch me” moment.

She reflects on advice to aspiring authors, meeting impossible deadlines while raising four children, the pros and cons of traditional vs. self-publishing, and learning to see closed doors as redirections rather than failures. With her first successful book series, “Out of Jerusalem,” as well as her Praiseworthy Award-winning book, “Rebekah and Isaac,” Heather’s story highlights the power of consistent effort, humility, and faith in the creative process, reminding us that when we keep showing up and stay close to the Lord, our gifts can grow in ways we never imagined.

*** Please SHARE Heather's story and help us spread hope and light to others. ***

To WATCH this episode on YouTube, visit: https://youtu.be/L-Oo9AJd2aY

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To READ Heather’s book series, “Out of Jerusalem,” visit: https://a.co/d/0hWacFEA

To READ Heather’s book, “Rebekah and Isaac (Women of the Covenant),” visit: https://a.co/d/065deF6S

To READ more of Heather’s work, visit: https://amzn.to/45O8phG

To LEARN MORE about Heather’s writing, visit: https://hbmoore.com/ 

To FOLLOW Heather on Instagram, visit: https://www.instagram.com/authorhbmoore/ 

To FOLLOW Heather on Facebook, visit: https://www.facebook.com/groups/37783537691

To FOLLOW Heather on TikTok, visit: https://www.tiktok.com/@heatherbmooreauthor 

To WATCH Heather on YouTube, visit: https://www.youtube.com/@heatherbmoore

To READ Scott’s new book “Faith to Stay” for free, visit: https://www.faithtostay.com/

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Also, if you have a faith-promoting or inspiring story, or know someone who does, please let us know by going to https://www.latterdaylights.com and reaching out to us.

Scott Brandley:

Hey there, as a Latter Day Lights listener, I want to give you a very special gift today. My brand new book, Faith to Stay. This book is filled with inspiring stories, powerful discoveries, and even fresh insights to help strengthen your faith during the storms of life. So if you're looking to be inspired, uplifted, and spiritually recharged, just visit faith2.com. Now, let's get back to the show. Hey everyone, I'm Scott Brandley.

Darla Brandley:

And I'm Darla Brandley. Every member of the church has a story to share, one that can instill faith, invite growth, and inspire others.

Scott Brandley:

On today's episode, we're going to hear from U.S. Today's best-selling author, Heather B. Moore, and how she's used perseverance and a lot of prayer to forge a full-time writing career. Welcome to Latter Day Lights. We're really excited to introduce our special guest, Heather B. Moore, to the show. Welcome, Heather.

Heather Moore:

Thanks so much for having me. I appreciate it.

Scott Brandley:

Yeah, we're really excited to hear about some of the books that you've written and kind of your career, how you got to where you are, some of the highs, some of the lows. That'll be exciting. But before we jump into that, why don't you tell us a little bit about yourself?

Heather Moore:

So my name is Heather B. Moore. I always use the B in my name because there's another author, Heather Moore, out there. I currently live in Utah County in Utah, and I have four grown children, one grandson, and a menagerie of pets. There's quite a few of them around. Yeah, I've been writing for over 20 years now. And I've just been grateful to be able to write a lot of books for the LES community as well as more national-oriented books.

Scott Brandley:

Okay, so you kind of do a mix. And what kind of genre do you typically like to write?

Heather Moore:

So I mostly write historical fiction. I've written anything from ancient historicals like biblical and Book of Mormon, both Old Testament and New Testament fiction. And I also more modern historical fiction like the Cold War and the 80s. And I also do some contemporary. Um as far as um the LDS market, I've written LDS nonfiction, inspirational nonfiction. And so I kind of just dabble in whatever I find interesting, which is obviously a lot of things.

Darla Brandley:

Okay. That's awesome.

Scott Brandley:

All right. Well, we're excited to hear about your your story and how you got into this. So why don't we turn the time over to you and tell us where your story begins?

Heather Moore:

Great. I just was I always thought it's kind of an interesting story of how I got started. Um, I was 30 when I first started writing my first book. And I had been helping my grandmother with her personal history. And I was driving up to Saltley County about once a week with my kids when they were pretty little and asking her questions and writing up her story and then having her read it and make corrections or changes. And while we were going through this process, I had a story idea that would take place kind of during her era when she grew up, when she was a young mother during World War II era. And I thought, well, just maybe write a short story and submit to magazines. Back then, magazines like Red Book and Good Housekeeping, they would publish novelettes. And as I was writing, it just kept getting longer and longer and longer until it was probably close to 300 pages. And I thought, I think I just wrote a book. And I don't know what to do with it. Of course, it was horrible. I I didn't really know it was horrible yet, but I thought I need to find a publisher for this book. So I went to the Lehigh Library, which is just a really tiny library back then. It's gone through different renovations since then. And I looked up this giant book and it's called Publishers Marketplace, and it lists the names and addresses of the publishers and what they're looking for. And back then, this is, you know, over 20 years ago, is you had to print out sample chapters and print out your query letter, and then also send a self-addressed stamp envelope to get your rejection. And so I was doing that for, I don't know, a few months. And then I remember looking up online, and this is, of course, back when we had dial up internet, and I found the League of Utah writers, and they had a chapter group in Provo that met at the library down there. And so I started going to that once a month, and I just was really fascinated hearing other authors and how they got published. And then there was a group of them that were in a critique group, and I started meeting with this critique group every week. And we would bring our maybe six to eight pages at a time and would read through them, and then everyone would go around the table and slash up your chapter and give you feedback, you know, obviously good feedback, but things that you needed to fix. And I felt like I was really going back to college. I thought this is what I didn't learn in college, but if I want to get a book published, I need to learn this. So I was bringing this first book, and um, I remember some of the questions they would ask me, like, where are we, Heather? Where are your characters and what are they doing? I'm like, I don't know. They're in a kitchen or they're outside in a tent. And because it just shows you I just knew nothing about setting a scene and also what is character characterization and all these things that you learn in high school, but you just totally forget, right? Once you're out of high school. So I really just learned writing and developing scenes and structure from the ground up. And so that first book, I was I took part of it through my critique group. I was sending it out. No one was interested. Um, so I brought another book. I wrote a mystery and I finished that mystery or I was taken to critique group. And I remember submitting to a local publisher, and they wrote back this very nice rejection letter. So there's kind of like a hard hierarchy of rejection letters. There's when you don't hear back anything, they just ghost you. And the next step up is when they send a form rejection, which looks like I mean, nowadays we all have our own printers, but back then they're just Zerox copies, and you could tell it'd been Zerox over and over and over by the time it got to you. Um and then the next level up is a personal rejection letter, which it would have your name on it. It might be, you know, typed up kind of customized to what your book was about. So I got a personal personalized rejection letter, and I said, We really like your writing, and we're very interested in the story until about page 35, and we realized you had not done your research. And um, it was kind of like a mystery, like a kidnapping mystery starts out with a kidnapping. And in my mind, I'm like, well, I'm not gonna go talk to a cop and ask him questions. Like, anyway, I just had this like kind of mind freeze. Like, I wasn't gonna go research what this book needed if I was gonna write about police procedure in this story. So I didn't, and I stopped submitting that book. And it sounds kind of strange to spend a couple months, maybe three months, writing a book and then just kind of give up on it. But that's what I did, and maybe that was part of my learning arc or something. And so I was looking around at the marketplace, and a couple of the members of my critique group were publishing with Covenant Communications or Desert Book, and so they're publishing with other local publishers. And I thought, well, maybe I'll write um a book specifically for one of those publishers. So I decided to write historical fiction on the Book of Mormon because in my mind I was thinking, okay, this would be very interesting to kind of research. But yeah, when it's fictionalized, you have a little bit of leeway, and um and I feel like it might have a broad audience, a broader audience um than what else I was writing. So of course I was just naive and none of that stuff would turn out to be true. But I I remember just writing the first chapter and thinking my critique group is going to just be so excited and be so impressed. And um, there'll be angels singing as I'm reading this, and they'll be like, wow, Heather, this is amazing. Well, none of that happened. They were all dead silent, and then finally one of them said, You know, there's another Book of Mormon series out there. And I just had no idea because when I went to the LDS bookstores in Utah, I would, you know, buying like a baptism gift or something. I wasn't there necessarily looking for my fictional reads. And so, and then one lady in the critique group just said, Well, this is a lot different, and um, you should keep writing it because I've read the other series and it and it has a different starting point, a different, you know, kind of family it follows. And so my series I had started writing was Nephi was a main character. And then, of course, other members of his family weren't there. So I finished the book and I submitted to Desert Book, and they sent me a re I think the rejection letter was kind of the middle tier one. It wasn't totally well, I guess it was personalized because it did say we will never, and I felt like the never was bolded, but maybe it wasn't bolded, but it felt bolded to me. Um, published scripture fiction, or I think it said Book of Mormon fiction. And I said, Okay, so strike one, right? So then I submitted to Covenant Communications Next. But the only thing is Covenant had published this other Book of Mormon series. So I was a little bit iffy thinking um with this other series, if there's more books coming out, they may not be interested in mine. But I submitted anyway, and um a few months later, they they wrote back and they said that they that I didn't have Lehi as main character and they would like to see him as one of the main characters. And so that was quite a big revision. So that took me probably a couple months to work on. And so I resubmitted the book, and then more months went by, and I thought, well, they asked me for this revision. That means they're they're interested at least. And then I got another message from them several months later and just said they decided not to publish my book. Um, but good luck, you know, all that stuff. And I just was thinking, okay, now what do I do? Because back then self-publishing was not a very viable option. Um, we didn't have Amazon, we didn't have online shopping really at all. And so to self-publish, you had to pay for your print run, and then you had to try to sell it at like, I don't know, a city fair during the summer at a booth or something. So it was it was very difficult to self-publish and very expensive. And I remember talking to my husband and just telling him, well, I guess this is another throwaway book. And he said, and he at the time he was working in software sales, and he said, you know, in my industry, when our client turns down our offer, that's when we know we need to go in there and we need to, you know, fight for it. Like, well, you don't do that on publishing. Like, you don't go into the publisher's office, they'd probably, you know, call the cops on you or something. I don't know. So he just, you know, and he just kept kept telling me all these different stories, experiences he had. So I thought, okay, fine, I will email them and see if they'll meet with me, which of course terrified me. And I was just hoping they would say no. But they said yes. And so I went and I met with the managing editor. And in the meantime, I had written up like a marketing plan and I had um written up just, you know, kind of like the pitch of the book and who I think the readership would be, and just I don't even know. I mean, it's I don't know if I can even find it anymore. But um I went in and I talked to the managing editor, and she I just remember her being really nice to me. But you know how there's people that are just really nice, and you're thinking, are they really nice or are they secretly laughing at you or just thinking, oh, this poor little author, she's such a sweet, you know, bless her heart kind of thing.

Darla Brandley:

Yeah, right.

Heather Moore:

So, and I just I had no idea how to read her because I had never met her before and I didn't know and I didn't know her. Um so I went home just not really feeling like I felt like I had I had made my case at least, and my husband, you know, could stop bugging me about it and I could say, hey, I went and I met with him, like he thought I should. And about a week went by and I got a phone call. And I remember it very clearly because I was watching some of the neighbor kids with my kids. So there's always four and five year olds running around my house, you know, the noise. And so I stepped out in the garage when I realized it was Covenant calling me, and it was cold, it was winter, it was cold, the garage was freezing, and I had bare feet, and I just stand there on the top step with cold feet, and they told me they had changed their minds. And I just I had this like like I just couldn't believe it because I knew that this was really a phone call that was going to change my life. And I didn't know how much at the time, but I just had been writing enough. I had enough manuscripts rejected and enough that I had given up on because this was technically my fourth book I had written. So other manuscripts I had given up on for different reasons. Um and I knew this was this was kind of the end of the road for me. If they had turned it down, then I'd have to try to find something else to write. Um, because back then we kind of afforded doing self-publishing. And I didn't really want to self-publish, and now I do self-publish. So this was just at the time I didn't want to self-publish because the whole point of the story was to get it into bookstores where readers would find it. Um and I just didn't have the connections to do that. And so they they just just having, I don't know, just that chain of events brought me to the point of getting a book published. And I was so grateful and it was very exciting, and I just learned so much because the first thing the editor told me when he went through and was giving me the feedback is he said, and I can't remember exactly, I think I had seven or eight point point of view characters in there, which is probably okay for like a giant fantasy, but this was like a 250-page historical novel. And he said, You need to you need to whittle it down to maybe three or four. So I went down, I think, to four, and that was kind of a big rewrite as well, because there are scenes where you have to decide, am I gonna keep the scene? Um, and if I do, can I just swap the point of view? I mean, obviously it's still rewriting, but you're not losing everything. Right. Um I got that turned, I got it turned in, and meanwhile, I had my fourth baby that early summer, and the book was coming out in the fall. And back then, this was uh 2004, so it dates me a little bit, is is Covenant. They would have the authors do two to three book signings at Siegel Book on Saturdays for about six to eight weeks, which is great because you want to get out there, especially as a new author. Um, but you're going from store to store, and it was, and my kids were little enough, so we didn't have Saturday conflicts. Like if you have kids as they get older, they're gonna have band practice or they're gonna have, you know, a soccer game or something. Um, so we're all load on my van. I was nursing my baby, and my husband would drive me to the book signing and drop me off, and he'd go find something to do with the kids and then come pick me up or nurse the baby and then go to the next signing. And so we did that for like week after week. And I remember people saying, Oh, this is the first book in the series. And I said, Yes, because book one, um, I hadn't like panned out the whole series, but book one took them to, I'm trying to remember even when it went to. Um, I think it took them to when they're about to build the ship, um, somewhere in there. And so of course they gotta have another book so they can build the ship. And I was um just saying, oh yeah, the next book, yeah, oh, I haven't written it, but it'll come out maybe next year. And I thought I should probably email my publisher and ask them if I want my book to come out a year from now, because I knew enough, I wasn't totally naive on everything, but I knew enough that with the series, it's usually like a book a year, and that's kind of how you keep the momentum going with the series. And so I said, if I want this book to come out next fall, when do I need to turn the book in? And this was like probably the third week of September, and they said December 1st. And that's crazy because that's like all of October, all of November. But it that's not just writing, that's having the book good enough to be accepted because I have written several books that were not good enough to be accepted, so I didn't want to go backwards. And so I was thinking, I don't know how am I gonna do this, but I have, but but this is a chance that not a lot of people, a lot of authors are being given right now. I need to take it. So um I definitely turned to prayer. That was something I really I really needed to think. This is outside of outside of my mortal strength. I don't know how to do this. How am I gonna write a book that would be good enough to be accepted and then be the next in the series? And the intimidation of not of just writing a book knowing that this page might actually be a final page in a book. Because previously, when I was writing my other books, it's like, I don't know, it's kind of like you're just hoping and dreaming and and always editing and just never like feeling that that really that, I guess, not I don't know if it's intense pressure, but it's definitely a pressure to make sure this book is gonna be publishable. So I had remembered through like praying and trying to figure out how am I gonna how am I gonna do this? I have four little kids. Um my oldest, I think he was about nine and had the baby at home and the two in between. And my husband at the time, he was working for a company where he traveled a lot. So so theoretically, I knew put the kids to bed, and then I could work at night. But I'm like a morning person. So by the time the kids are in bed, I'm basically ready for bed too. So I had remembered um reading this book, and I was a big Mary Higgins Clark mystery reader growing up as a teenager. And I came across a memoir of hers several years before this called Kitchen Privileges. And in it, she talked about how she had been widowed when I think she had three or four children, and she had to go back to work full-time, but she had always wanted to be a writer. So she would write from four to seven in the morning and then get her kids up off to school, and then she would go to work the rest of the day. And I and I was like, well, if Mary can do it, I can do it. And so that's what I did is I wrote from four to seven in the morning for the next six or seven weeks and got that first draft done. And sometimes my nursing baby was up with me, and and some days it didn't happen. There's some days things, of course, fall apart, you know, kids are sick in the middle of the night. And so, but that's how I got that first draft done. And I was um, I had some readers that I put on alert say, hey, you know, I'm gonna be sending this you this book to read, and I just need a really fast turnover so I can get it submit to my publisher. So I made the deadline and I learned, first of all, that um with the Lord's help, you really can accomplish something very hard, even though you feel like there's a lot of things stacked against you. Um the second thing I learned is that um I need to come out of my little introverted box and communicate more and find out things like deadlines and find out and and be more educated in the publishing industry and not just, oh, you know, find out things by accident, but try to be more intentional about where I want my career to go and how I want it to look. Um and so when so then I knew my deadlines in advance. I was starting, and so I usually start a book like six months in advance, and even if it takes me three or four months to write, it's giving me that kind of buffer time in case, you know, there is an emergency that comes up or there's a health issue or something, and and I'm not able to like be writing regularly, um, and also gives you time to get those readers to look at your book and see if there's adjustments you should make so that you can truly turn in your best work to your publisher. So I just was so grateful to have that opportunity, and um I know it was a lot of work, but I was grateful to maybe have the opportunity. Opportunity to really rely on Henry Father, rely on prayer in that way that I hadn't maybe before.

Scott Brandley:

What did you have any feelings of inadequacy or like especially when you started to go do book signings? Did you any imposter syndrome or anything like that when you started?

Heather Moore:

I think I don't think I have imposter syndrome in the traditional sense. I think that mine translates into people saying, Oh, I loved your book and I don't totally believe them. I think, oh, you're just being nice to me. So maybe I think they're the imposter.

Darla Brandley:

Yeah. I think we all do that. I think we all do that. Anybody gives you a compliment and it's it's like, well, thank you.

Heather Moore:

You don't let me know. Yeah. It does make you feel good and it makes you grateful. But also you think, well, maybe they're just being nice because they're seeing me in person. Um, but I also don't think that my book, I think my books are are good, but good for what they are. But whenever I read like an another book, especially like literary fiction, like I'm just like, they're the language is so beautiful. Like I just I'm not that person, I'm not that writer. And so I have to just know that going into it.

Darla Brandley:

But that doesn't mean you can't enjoy the book, right? Just because it doesn't have all the beautiful language, you can still enjoy the book and get into the story and be caught up in it as well.

Heather Moore:

Yeah, I I agree. I think that I think that when I read a book, like I put my own experiences into it. So then I take out things that are personal to me. And I think that's other readers will do that. So a reader might say, Oh, I love this book, and it's because they connected and it helped them like maybe see something in a new light or just validated something. And so that's why they're saying it. They're not really saying, you know, your prose was just the most outstanding, you know, words I've or description I've ever read. They're not really saying that.

Scott Brandley:

Yeah. What was the name of that book series?

Heather Moore:

Um, so my first book series is called Out of Jerusalem. And the and it ended up being four books, and it took Nephi's family from Jerusalem to the Promised Land. And the first book, the subtitle was Of Goodly Parents. And I actually got, and it was actually under H. B. Moore was my name, I write, um, biblical fiction or scripture fiction.

Scott Brandley:

Okay. So as you so now you're you finished this series, now you've written seven or eight books total, right? Because you had those first three that didn't go anywhere, but then you wrote the series. So where did you go from there?

Heather Moore:

Um, so so I I continue to write a Book of Mormon fiction. I wrote Benedite, Alma, Alma the Younger, um, and then I did a Daughters of Jared. And for some reason, my Daughters of Jared book just didn't sell very well. And it's it was, I think it's one of my favorite Book of Mormon stories I've written, but I felt like because it kind of was going down this slide that I should try something a little bit different. So I started writing biblical fiction. And in the meantime, I wrote a thriller series that actually has a religious undertone as well with another publisher. And then in 2012, I think it was, um, when when I had a couple friends that were doing a lot of self-publishing, I decided to start self-publishing romance anthologies and just kind of other types like sweet romance, sweet contemporary romance, and sweet historical romance. And then in 20, I think it's 2018 or 2019, uh, Shadow Mountain approached me to write general historical fiction. So now I have a few books out with Shadow Mountain, and those are I have three World War II novels and a Cold War novel, and then some other in-betweeners. How do you So did you go back to that first one and like rewrite it? Is that one of the So I did not the very first one. I did rewrite one of my very early books, probably the second book I wrote. Um, and that was my self-publishing experiment book. So I I I did I did the uploading with you know the formatting and I was hiring out formatters, but I was like doing every stage with the audio and the cover design and stuff and kind of learning how to manage all that.

Darla Brandley:

Awesome.

Scott Brandley:

And how do you research for those type of books? Like what's what what's the process to make sure it's accurate?

Heather Moore:

Yeah, it's well, there are some that are a couple of my books are biographical fiction, so that means there's no fictional characters or fictional events in the book. Um and and those books are they're a little bit of a slower read because there's just not because it's just the real story of this real person. Um, but I'll go and find biographies, like the most real respected biographies, and also just find anything that like covers the history of that specific era, because I I like to like also, um, especially like with World War II, because you can follow like a single person's story, but there's so much going on in the world that you also want to kind of bring in what was your character's reaction when they maybe found out some of these news items as they were dealing with other things. Um, for instance, when I wrote my book, it's called The Slow March of Light, and it's set mostly in East Germany. And it, but it, but it takes place during the early 60s when the Berlin Wall went up. And so I felt like just to write kind of the slice of history, I needed to understand the history of of you know the oc the occupation of Germany by both the by the allies and how they split it up. And so I would just find documentaries I could or go to like YouTube or Amazon Prime or anywhere I could find like a documentary on the Cold War and watch and take notes. And then if I could find um, there's actually this book, it's called Checkpoint Charlie. It's really interesting. So the American checkpoint that is um in East Berlin, it it was though, it was in the it bordered the American quadrant, but then goes into the Soviet-occupied territory. Um, but this book is just about what happened at this checkpoint over the entire Cold War, starting in the 40s. Well, and then I mean it wasn't really a checkpoint, an official checkpoint until the wall went up, but it was still um, there was still like a border there, so they still had to, you know, get people through this border. Um anyway, so it's just really interesting, just have one book just on this one checkpoint.

Scott Brandley:

That's awesome. So uh and then you've obviously continued to write and self-publish since that, since you started self-publishing, but you but you have worked with publishers too, right? So you're kind of doing both.

Heather Moore:

Yeah, so I I still write for Shadow Mountain. And um my book, my last book with Covenant came out in 2024, and then they have um they've kind of changed what they're asking for. And so a book I had turned into Covenant on Elizabeth and Zachary, I ended up self-publishing that one. Um and then I also have I've written some like sports romances with two author friends, Rebecca Connolly and Jen Geigel Johnson. And we did for years, we we did these sports romances together, and we just sold those to a UK publisher, so they're gonna recover them and and kind of spread out, spread them out more into the market. Um so there's always something going on.

Darla Brandley:

All right.

Scott Brandley:

Well, and so one of the reasons why we're on doing this podcast today is because you recently won a praiseworthy award at LDS PMA for your book Rebecca and Isaac.

Heather Moore:

Yeah.

Scott Brandley:

So tell us a little bit about that that book.

Heather Moore:

Yeah, so that was my book. That one came out in 2024 with Covenant, and it was an interesting book to write because I I was trying to find like a story where where there was like like a story of faith, a story of sacrifice, a story of faith, which of course happens with Rebecca and Isaac because Rebecca leaves, she has to go just completely on faith to leave her homeland and go marry a man she's never met. And Isaac, we know he has um a great story of faith, but I had kind of a hang-up because when I was doing research on the whole family, including Abraham and and Sarah, I guess we call her Sarah now. So when I when I first started doing research on the whole family, I just did not like Abraham because the more I learned and the about him and the more I studied the decisions he made, I was thinking, I don't know. It's it's hard when you're studying an ancient culture and ancient traditions with like a modern mind, because you just want to like wring their necks and say, why did you do that? Or that is so wrong. Or anyway, so my hing up was that he sent Hagar away with Ishmael. And um I just couldn't understand why you would send your. I mean, he Hagar was his wife. I know that she was given to him by Sarah, but it was it's still your wife. Like, why don't you stand up for her or at least set her up in a camp someplace? So, because an Ishmael is your son. Anyway, so I met with Dr. Carrie Muelstein at BYU because he is an expertise on Abraham. I said, You have to talk me off the ledge here because I'm trying to write a book about this revered patriarch, but I don't revere him. So help me out. And he it's really interesting. He like explained to me um a few things, and then he also had this book that just kind of came, just had come out around that same time when I was researching, called From Creation to Sinai. And it's a really big book, and it has like different articles and essays from all these different scholars that are talking about exactly what I was trying to figure out. And and long story short is is I realized that um, first of all, Abraham knew that this is the right thing to do, even though Sarah was kind of the one saying she's gotta go. Um and Abraham knew that in order for Ishmael to become his own tribal leader and to have his own sons and to eventually start would be, you know, his own kind of dynasty, he couldn't do under Abraham because Isaac was a birthright. And so Ishmael had to separate from the tribe. And then he also then he had this amazing um leadership himself, and so it was oh, and the other thing about Hagar, my hang my thing about Hagar is that um because she had come as a handmaiden, it meant that she had probably been purchased through the slave trade. And usually when you are done with the slave, you sell them back. And so for Sarah and Abraham to say, no, we're not selling you back, you can now go and um be the matriarch of your son's tribe. That was actually very kind and um where I was looking at as very negative. It was actually a very positive thing.

Scott Brandley:

So yeah, it's it's interesting because we, you know, when you do look into history, you didn't we can't we can't walk in their shoes, right? And we don't know everything that happened back then. So you do the best you can to get the context, but sometimes you miss it. Yeah.

Darla Brandley:

And there are those cultural things that we just we just don't understand because ours is so different.

Heather Moore:

It's true. Like we feel like I would I would never let that happen, or I would go and say this, but they didn't even have that thought at all, like we do.

Scott Brandley:

Yeah.

Darla Brandley:

That's very interesting. Yeah.

Scott Brandley:

So um what advice would you have for upcoming writers that are just getting started? Um, maybe something that could help them to overcome some of the obstacles that they might face.

Heather Moore:

Um, so what has helped me is is kind of set my own personal goals, like whether it's writing 500 words a day, five days a week, or um getting some sort of writer journal and doing stickers or some sort of reward. You know, I can go out to lunch, you know, if I hit my goals for a month or something. But just find something that is kind of personal to you to help motivate you because it's one thing that's very hard about being a writer is it does it takes a long time to write a book, it can take a really long time to get published, and then a long time to get paid. And so your spouse or your friend or your child is like, okay, it's been like three years. And so you have to like find a way to keep yourself motivated. Um, but also just approach approach publishing professionally, um, meet your deadlines when, of course, possible, and be nice in a sandbox because the publishing world is very small, and and there's a lot, there's a lot of writers, a lot of writers have egos, or if not egos, then at least a lot of emotions. And so you just need to play nice and be kind, like you do with everything else in life. Um, everybody has their own struggles with with whatever they're doing. You might see a friend of yours win an award, or you might see them get a contract, and you just celebrate with them because maybe you'll be next and maybe you won't, but but they but we've all have been kind of fighting the same fight. And so it's good to just lift each other up and um don't resent each other. Another thing I would just say is um is you know, make it make it powerful. And maybe your journey is gonna be different than someone else's journey, and that's okay. Maybe your journey is is writing articles and inspiring just that those handful of people that really needed to read what you write. Um maybe it's writing something really cool, like a fantasy series, and you can go speak at school assemblies and inspire kids to follow their dreams. Like we're all gonna have different impacts in different ways.

Darla Brandley:

So true.

Scott Brandley:

And how would you um what advice would you give about when they do hit a failure or a roadblock? How did what's the best way to overcome that?

Heather Moore:

So I think you just have to look at it is a lot of times when you hit a failure on publishing, it's it's really a business decision and it's not personal. Um and it's it's easy to kind of say that just off the cuff. But um, sometimes it's just about numbers or or it just maybe the editor's having a bad day. Like it's you just don't know all the time. Um, but I really believe that if you know a door closes, a window opens, I really believe that because there are so many choices right now, especially with sub-published publishing. I've had some really, really hard rejections, rejections, and but then I turned that into a blessing thinking, I can self-publish, I know how to self-publish. Um, I've been doing it for a long time. So even though this, I would have loved to have this book with this publisher or in this system, um, I can still get this book out maybe in a different way. And so just know that it's not if you get published anymore, it's when you get published and how you want to do it. And with, for example, with my Elizabeth and Zacharias book, um, I was able to just kind of take my time and and I had like a map done for the book, and I had some really cool stuff done for the book that I maybe normally wouldn't have if if I was working with a publisher that had kind of just a set budget, you know, that they're not gonna move from because they they can only do so much for one book because they have to stay within their budget.

Scott Brandley:

Right. That makes sense. Well, this has been awesome, Heather. Thanks so much for sharing some of your experiences and highs, lows, wins, losses.

Heather Moore:

They continue.

Scott Brandley:

Yeah. So what's what's next?

Heather Moore:

So I have uh it's a nonfiction book on eight women who transformed America that's coming out in August. It's called Her America. And so that's my next. So we're just kind of in the very final edits right now with that book.

Darla Brandley:

That's awesome. I'm excited for that one.

Heather Moore:

So crossing fingers will be okay for the readers.

Scott Brandley:

Yeah, great. Well, as we kind of wrap up, do you have any final thoughts you'd like to share?

Heather Moore:

Yeah, I would just say um don't don't give up. If you want to get published, don't give up. Just follow your heart. It's totally possible to achieve your dreams. Um stay creative, stay close to the Lord. And I think creativity and writing is definitely a gift that we can cultivate in many, many ways.

Scott Brandley:

Yeah. Well, and I think, you know, like we all have gifts, and the way we improve those gifts is to keep working at them. Yeah, right. And I'm I'm sure you feel like you're a much better writer now than when you started 20 years ago. Yeah. So that's great. Well, thanks so much, Heather. Uh Darla, any last thoughts or questions you have?

Heather Moore:

No, I just say good luck, everyone. Um, you can find me on social media. I'm happy to ask questions if you're starting out and you just have questions that you know just need someone to use as a soundboard. I'm happy to answer any questions. That's awesome.

Darla Brandley:

That's awesome. I was really interested in everything that you had to say. Now I want to I wrote down the books because I want to go and get them now and read them. I'm so excited. Awesome.

Scott Brandley:

She is a big reader, she's constantly reading.

Heather Moore:

So I like reading. I'm so excited. Yeah, I do a lot of audio. Like, I'll even um I love I love the Libby app. I don't know if you've heard of that, or or Bookshelf Plus, which is Rabbit Desert Book, where you can Libby is is from the library, so it's just an app and you can get ebooks or audiobooks. Um, so that definitely helps cut the budget a little.

Darla Brandley:

Yes. I know it can it's it can get expensive.

Scott Brandley:

I'm if we had to choose between food or buying books, Darla, which one would you pick?

Darla Brandley:

Um that one's hard. I could come back up. I might go on a diet.

Scott Brandley:

All right. Well, thanks, Heather, so much for coming on. We really appreciate you. And everyone, let's go and share Heather's story. Make sure you hit that share button and let's do our five-second missionary work. And if you guys have any any questions or comments you'd like um Heather to answer, make sure you go put those in the comments so she can see those. And if you have a story that you'd like to share, go to latterdaylights.com or email us at latterdaylights at gmail.com. So thanks again, Heather. Thanks, Darla, for hanging out, my co-host. And we will talk to you guys next week with another episode of Latterday Lights. Till then, take care. Bye-bye.

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Scott Brandley

Host
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Alisha Coakley

Co-host