Author Bio
Deborah Bedford began writing when she was ten years old after she finished reading Louisa May Alcott's novel, Little Women. She promptly took pen in hand, found shade beneath the old mimosa tree in the front yard and, because the story would not let her alone, began turning Little Women into a play. That began the long and frustrating process of getting into trouble in school for scribbling stories in spiral notebooks instead of listening in class. Now Deborah's novels have been published in twenty different countries and in over a dozen different languages. Her books have garnered numerous awards and have appeared on the USA Today bestseller list, the CBA bestseller list, and chosen as a Doubleday Book of the Month Alternate Selection.
Deborah is president and co-founder, along with Tim Sandlin, of the prestigious Jackson Hole Writers Conference, which brings writers the likes of Sue Grafton, Susan Isaacs, Wally Lamb, Billie Letts, John Nichols, Anne Lamott, Tab Murphy, Olivia Goldsmith, William Broyles and Tony Hillerman to teach in Wyoming as well as to barbecue on the deck at Snow King resort and to climb mountains.
Until now, Deborah has built her career writing mass-market fiction. A Rose By The Door marks her first novel-length venture into inspirational fiction, something that feels to her like gloriously falling forward and wondrously coming home, all at the same time. She already felt impelled to write this story. But then she met Jamie Raab, publisher at Warner, and the rest, as everyone says, felt like stars moving into place.
Deborah and her husband, Jack, have two children, Jeff, 16, and Avery, 12. When she isn't writing, she spends her time fly-fishing, cheering at Babe Ruth baseball games, singing praise songs while she walks along the banks of Flat Creek, and taking her dachshund Annie for low-slung hikes in the Tetons where they live.
Favorite novels enjoyed by Deborah Bedford
Authors and their books who have greatly affected my career are Louisa May Alcott, especially one of her lesser-known novels entitled Eight Cousins, Madeleine L'Engle, Episcopalian priest and author of The Crosswicks Journals and A Wrinkle In Time, who wrapped her arms around me at Mount Calvary Monastery in Santa Barbara and welcomed me into the fold, Harper Lee, who wrote To Kill A Mockingbird, Catherine Marshall, who wrote Christy and Mr. Jones, Meet The Master, and my grandmother, Dorothy Shell Bunting, who-at ninety years old—has just been published in The Story Jar. She was first to put beautiful writing into my hands when I was young.
Other things I'd recommend include creative non-fiction by my friend Jeremy Schmidt, his book Himalayan Passage and his numerous articles in National Geographic Magazine, the novel Redeeming Love by Francine Rivers, Two In The Far North by Margaret Murie, and Crossing To Safety by Wallace Stegner. Also try Cold Sassy Tree by Olive Ann Burns, Then Came Heaven and Morning Glory by LaVyrle Spencer, Jan Karon's The Mitford Series, The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis, The Forgiving Hour by Robin Lee Hatcher, The Science of God by Gerald L. Schroeder, and A Walk To Remember by Nicholas Sparks.