Nicole M. Miller

I  published  14 pre teen and YA novels  at Random House, Holiday House, and Simon and Schuster, but a novel for adult readers,  the story of Ada Wentworth, a young Bostonian hatmaker transplanted to southern Appalachia,  kept swirling in my head. I first envisioned the story as The Sunday Hat Society, centering on the friendship of a group of women in the country church in Hickory Ridge, but the more I delved into it, the more I realized it was really about Ada’s struggle to forgive the two men in her life who had wronged her, and trust God with her future and her heart. As I worked on this book, the voices of two supporting characters, Carrie Daly and Sophie, a mixed race...

There’s an old family story my mom told me about my gramma, Clara Brekke. Sometime back in the early 1900’s, Clara’s father took her two-year-old sister and walked out the front door. Just like that. No bags packed. Not a word about where they were going or when they’d return. Nothing. No one ever heard from them again. As a result, I’ve always been curious about missing people. Assuming they’ve not suffered with violence or are choosing to remain incognito, where exactly do they go? And that’s the premise for my next book UNDERCURRENT, coming out May 1st by Risen books. Here’s a blurb: People go missing every day. Many...

I am currently rewriting my first novel. Though still unpublished, the novel concept grabbed the attention of an agent, and ultimately a contract. After ten years, I could readily see the flaws. Yet, if the story grabbed an agent, there had to have been something memorable about it. The plot idea came to me after a contact with a cousin I hadn’t seen for nearly twenty years, a cousin I was very close to growing up. In our case, we merely drifted away. I wondered about what rifts might separate two teenage cousins who were closer than sisters. Thanks for stopping by, Linda! Visit her website here!

  Shades of Morning was a gift from Andy on one ordinary Sunday morning at church. I went not expecting to see anything different, or special, or extraordinary. But God had other plans. And so did Andy. In the middle of the third song, a noise came from the far side of the church. A loud noise. Strange, awkward, and off-key. Then, it grew louder. I furrowed my brow. Was that someone singing . . . badly? I stood on tiptoes and peeked toward the sound. And there was Andy. His arms were raised, his eyes closed. And he was singing to his God for all he was worth. Andy,...

  Years ago, my dad started sending me and my mom Valentine’s gifts, either flowers, balloons, or candy. When my dad hit 60, it hit me that my parents were aging and I wouldn’t have them forever. Feeling melancholy, one Valentine’s Day, my flowers came and I wondered how I’d feel the first year they didn’t come. My husband sends me flowers or gifts at other times of the year, but never Valentine’s Day. That’s Daddy’s day. I hoped that in Daddy’s future absence, my husband would continue the tradition. Then I decided I might go first and if that happened, Daddy would probably bring the flowers to the cemetery.