Called to Create: An LDSPMA Podcast

Heather B. Moore (a.k.a. H.B. Moore)

May 18, 2022 LDSPMA Season 2 Episode 8
Called to Create: An LDSPMA Podcast
Heather B. Moore (a.k.a. H.B. Moore)
Show Notes Transcript

Heather B. Moore’s beginner attempts to write books were akin to making tossed salad; She threw in ingredients and hoped they’d turn into a good story. Now, as a USA Today award-winning author of over 70 books in multiple genres, she views those early experiences as her version of “going back to college and learning how to write a novel.” Heather, who has also published as H.B. Moore, attended high school and college in the Middle East and thought of her first story idea while compiling her grandmother's personal history.

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Connie: 00:00 Welcome back, I'm Connie Sokol, your host. And once again, it is such a delight to talk with Latter-day Saint authors. And today we have another great one. We are so delighted to have Heather B. Moore with us today. Hi, Heather!

Heather: 00:14 Hi, thanks for having me, Connie. 

Connie: 00:16 Oh, it's such a joy. And I have been able to interview her before and, we were just saying, it feels like it was just yesterday. And it is just delightful to see your writing career morph and develop, just keep blooming and blossoming.

Connie: 00:29 And as you're being a mom, and as you were doing things in the Church, it's all in the mix. And that's what I love, and we're going to talk about that today of navigating this intersection between faith and creativity and professional skill. How do you do this on the daily? And giving tips and tools for those out there who are especially wanting to be writers.

Connie: 00:49 So let me give you the official bio, and then I want to share a couple of fun things of her and I, the experiences that we've shared together. She is Heather B. Moore, and she is a USA Today bestselling author of more than 70 publications. Yes, you heard that right. And she also has made meals and done laundry.

Connie: 01:06 I just wanted to impress the amazingness of that. Her historical novels and thrillers are written under the pen name. H. B. Moore, so if you've seen that, but she also writes women's fiction, romance, and inspirational nonfiction under Heather B. Moore. And I love the point she makes. She's like, “This is super confusing, so my kids just call me Mom.”

Connie: 01:23 Which I think is wisdom. The beautiful fact that I think is so interesting, she also attended Cairo American College in Egypt and the Anglican School of Jerusalem and earned a Bachelor of Science degree from Brigham Young University in Utah, which is just incredible that she's done all of these things.

Connie: 01:39 And you can see in her writing the weaving of all that learning coming into play. And we're going to talk about that as well today. She is also represented by Dystel, Goderich, and Bourret [literary agency], and we are so excited to have you here today. So let's just jump right in. I have loved being a part of your life in a very, very small way.

Connie: 01:58 We all just sort of fan girl, Heather. But at Storymakers, it's a writing conference for Latter-day Saint authors, and it's an incredible conference, 700 people, almost a thousand people. It's just incredible. But I remember we have connected there and then Heather taught a small writing class in the community, and I remember attending that.

Connie: 02:15 And even from those experiences, she helped plant that desire, not just desire, but that doability of, You can write this book that you feel impressed or compelled to write. So let's talk about what that was like for you. When did you feel that stirring in your soul to write? You have all this learning opportunities and things, but when did that really start to gel for you to take it and put it into a book and especially a novel?

Heather: 02:42 Well, first of all, I never thought I'd be a writer. I thought authors wore pearls and diamonds. They lived in New York or they lived in Los Angeles, in a beautiful house on the cliff. So they have like this muse 24/7, right? And I remember one of my neighbors gave me a book just because we were always swapping books. and it was by an author in Utah.

Heather: 03:02 And I thought, Oh, authors live in Utah. And it was just so silly of me to think that. And so I started reading more. I read, like, LDS fiction. I started reading more books by Utah authors, and I just thought, wow, this is like a whole nother industry. ‘Cause when I would go to a bookstore in Utah, like Deseret Book or Seagull Book, I was there to buy something to do with the scriptures or, you know what I'm saying?

Heather: 03:27 But I was actually, I was 30 years old. And I was helping my grandma write her personal history. And she lived about 30 miles from me. So once a week, I'd take my little kids up there and ask questions, and I'd write them down. And then I kind of compiled this history. But while I was working on that, I just had a story idea for a woman that had grown up in the same era as my grandmother.

Heather: 03:51 So obviously it was inspired by kind of her life in her era during the war, World War II. And I thought, Oh, maybe I'll just write like a short story. And I don't know, it was just a story that I thought I wanted to write, which I hadn't really felt compelled, outside of high school or college, to actually just write something fictional.

Heather: 04:10 Anyway. So I started writing and writing and it turned into a 300-page novel. And I had no idea what to do with it. I didn't know. I was just totally naïve. I didn't know plot. I didn't know character. I mean, except for what I learned maybe in English class 10 years before or 12 years before. And back then I lived in Lehi, Utah.

Heather: 04:30 The library is just a tiny, tiny library, but I was able to find a giant book called Writers Marketplace. And in those days you had to print off chapters and mail them with your own self-addressed, stamped envelope for your rejection. And so I did that for months and months, and I was just getting rejected, of course.

Heather: 04:49 And this is kind of when the internet was just getting going, and email was a thing, and everyone had dial-up internet, if you're lucky, at home. And I found a website for the League of Utah Writers, and I found out they had chapter meetings once a month in the Provo Library.

Heather: 05:08 And so I started going to those, and that was when my whole world really just shifted. Wow, there's people here from my same county and they're getting published and they're writing these novels. I ended up doing a critique group, and that's when I really learned how to write. So obviously that first book has never been published. 

Connie: 05:28 And there's always that one that stays in the drawer, which thank you to everybody, right? It’s merciful.

Connie: 05:33 But I love that family history for the win. That's the thing that catalyst this, that was the springboard. And that because of that, you started to see yourself in that realm. And then I love the next step where you just reached out. And you could instinctively feel you needed to connect with other people in order to move this forward, and in a doable way, once a week, still with children and still doing your thing as you went along.

Connie: 05:56 So did you decide at the beginning that you really wanted to focus on scriptural novels, or were you more like, Oh, I want to do fiction, or were you just sort of like, Whatever's coming, I'm going to write. 

Heather: 06:07 Oh, not at all. I mean, so my first book was set in World War II and it read like a memoir as far as it covered the woman's whole life, ‘cause I just didn't know what I was doing, right?

Heather: 06:17  I started when she was a teenager and it went until just her whole life. And I thought everybody would like this book from 12 and up until they're 102. And so I love to read mysteries. Mary Higgins Clark was one of my favorite mystery writers, and I had probably read everything she'd ever written.

Heather: 06:35 And so I thought, Well, I can't get this World War II novel published, so I'm going to write a mystery. It was a kidnapping mystery, and just being naïve and not understanding the industry at all is when I was shopping it or sending it out to publishers. This is when Elizabeth Smart was kidnapped from her home.

Heather: 06:53 And it was just this huge national media sensation going constantly on the news. And I thought, I wrote a kidnapping mystery. There's no way this will get published now. So I don't know, my mind just did not understand the industry. And that's the thing is you can write a book, but you also have to learn, educate yourself in the publishing industry. 

Heather: 07:13 Of course I could write a kidnapping mystery and of course there's thousands of them out there and of course they will sell. And so then I started writing another book. And I had finished that one and I did submit to a publisher. And they were really sweet and they wrote back and they said, We were 30 pages into your book and we were like, this is awesome. 

Heather: 07:34  We love the writing. We love everything. We love the main character, the detective, but then we realized you hadn't researched police procedures. And I'm like, No, well of course not because I'm not going to go talk to a cop and ask them questions. That was way too intimidating for my introverted self.

Heather: 07:49  And so that manuscript did nothing. So I decided… I didn't go back and research and clean up what I needed to clean up. I just started writing another book. And this one, I thought, Okay, I'm going to write something that no one can criticize my research.

Heather: 08:03 So, I wrote about this Puritan community. And it's kind of a mystery and there's a ghost in it. So again, I'm just throwing. I'm just making a salad.  

Connie: 08:12 Yeah, exactly. You're just chucking in ingredients and hoping it’ll all come together.

Heather: 08:16 But honestly, I don't know if I call them my practice books, but I was going to critique group. I was learning to plot, learning to characterize, learning description. 

Heather: 08:25 The ladies would say, Heather, where are we? I don't know. Well, are they sitting in the kitchen? Are they in the desert? Are they camping? And so, I had to learn how to set the scene. So it was kind of like I went back to college. So these three books were me going back to college and learning how to write a novel.

Heather: 08:43 So then I started looking at the actual marketplace before I was going to write my next book. I said, okay, what is not going on? Or what does the marketplace need? What will sell in the marketplace? What are my friends, my writer friends actually writing? And who are they writing for? So then I looked at the local publishers.

Heather: 09:04 And that's when I decided to write a historical series. And I was also still naïve. I decided to write a historical series with Nephi as the main character. And I remember chatting with my family about it. And my dad is a gospel scholar. And I thought, Well, he knows all this stuff, maybe he could co-write with me.

Heather: 09:26 And so I kind of explained what I was doing, and he was very sweet, but said, I do not write fiction. Okay. So then, I thought, Okay, I'm still going to write this book on Nephi, and maybe it'll be this really cool series. Like there's some other series out there, you know, in the LDS market. And so I wrote chapter one, and I thought it was really great, you know, because I had lived in the Middle East, so I have, like, this whole platform. And I have credentials.

Heather: 09:43 And so I take it to critique group, and I read it and I'm just waiting for them to say, Wow, this is amazing. This is your genre. This is your thing. And the first lady said to me, Well, you know, there's another series on Nephi’s family out there and book three is out and it’s this huge series.

Heather: 10:10 And I’m, like, I had no idea, Are you serious? And it was published by Covenant, which is the same publisher. I was hoping ‘cause a bunch of my writer friends were with them. And so, you know, it was just kind of a natural thing for me. And, anyway, but then she said, Well, this is different. This is written from a different point of view.

Heather: 10:28 You know, it starts at a different place in the book. So I just thought, Okay, well I'm just going to go for it. And that was my first book that was published. And the thing is when you start publishing in a certain genre, your publisher, especially if you're traditionally publishing, they'd like you to stay in that genre because you build up a readership in a market.

Heather: 10:46 So I ended up writing nine novels on the Book of Mormon and a nonfiction book on Women of the Book of Mormon. 

Connie: 10:53 Which is fantastic. Sorry, I have to make a plug for that. I learned so much about culture and what it's like living there and what it would have been like for them. And it's just enriched my scripture study so much.

Connie: 11:05 I love these sorts of touchpoints that you are sharing, of, the fire was lit, and then you connected with other people, and what a core gift that was. And then you realize the need for research, both in your own work for the craft, as well as in the marketplace. Following those trends, being able to see what resonated for you that was genuine and realistic.

Connie: 11:27 These are huge pieces. And just like you said, you allowed yourself, though, the journey to unfold that, to have the learning and not feel like a failure and just keep going and realize you're just unwrapping these boxes, right? These gifts that are just unwrapping layers and layers and layers. So I do want to segue for a minute because I love that...

Connie: 11:47 I can't even believe. You're so amazing in what you do. I mean, if you go on her blog, she is so free with how she became a USA Today bestselling author. She just absolutely details how she went through that process. And I've loved how open and free you are with your information. It's just beautiful. 

Connie: 12:06 But I look back through this and I'm seeing how you are now and you are so on it and so detailed and things. I hope it gives listeners hope that where they feel like I don't know how to do research, and I don't know how to do this stuff that you allowed yourself to learn along the way. So I want to segue back because your father, who is Professor S. Kent Brown, if anybody doesn't know out there.

Connie: 12:28 So he says he doesn't write fiction, but you guys have co-authored the “Divinity of Women” book together. But he has been an influence in your life. How has that impacted your writing, his knowledge and conversations with him and things like that. How has that influenced your writing, especially your historical novels and your scriptural writing?

Heather: 12:47 Yeah. So, my dad, he's written a lot too. It's all, of course non-fiction, most of it’s doctrinal. He's the kind of person who will spend five years on a book because he's getting every detail right. He's getting every reference right. And so, I think that has taught me that the research is worth it, that especially if it's historical, that the readers want it to be authentic because they want to learn. 

Heather: 13:12 And I like to read that genre. I like to read historical fiction because I want to learn. And maybe nonfiction can be more tiring, like if I'm reading about a deep subject. So I appreciate historical fiction writers who can educate me and entertain me at the same time.

Connie: 13:28 And that's the thing, like, when I'm reading your books, I'm learning so much. And I love that because I come away, now when I read the actual scriptures–and I understand there's a difference there–but when I'm reading the scriptures, I can envision things a little bit more. So let's talk about that for a second, because there is such a fine line between what is doctrinal and what is fiction, right? 

Connie: 13:48 And I know with Gerald Lund there was a comment somebody had made once that said, It's a really hard thing when he did the whole “Work and the Glory'' series, and people would get off the tour bus back east, and they'd say, Where's the Steve farm?

Connie: 13:59 And they're not a real family. So how do you navigate that line and make sure that that stays in a good spot.  

Heather: 14:08 Yeah, it is tricky, especially with my very first series on Nephi and then when they journey to the promised land. And of course, you know, I think, Oh, they went to the coast of South America.

Heather: 14:18 Well, not everyone believes that's where they landed. So, sometimes I had to take a position. And usually I tried to take the one that was the most generally well believed or the most supported through research and not to discount someone else's research that might be breakout research.

Heather: 14:33 And so, in my novels that are the very historical ones, like “Out of Jerusalem,” I would have chapter notes and I'd have an author note explaining if I deviated from a path, or a chapter where I got that particular research. And so Where did I find his iron ore and where do these scientists believe that iron ore was close enough to the surface of the earth for him just to dig it out?

Heather: 14:56 And so, because he wasn't a miner. You didn't have special teams to find it. But it was super helpful, my dad obviously was helpful in this process because I could ask him, I say, Hey, I have this question, and he wouldn't give me the answer a lot of times. He would say, In this book or this author or this scholar wrote an article or wrote a book.

Heather: 15:20 And so he would have me go look it up, and it really turned me into research going through that process. And it just made me also appreciate those scholars that really do, they dedicate their lives to these details that the majority of us don't ever hear about or read about.

Heather: 15:37 So it really was a privilege and an honor for me. And I call them scripture nerds or scholarly people, those highbrow intellects. I take their research and then I bring it down a few levels so the rest of us can enjoy it in a more palpable way. 

Connie: 15:55 I love it and put it in layman's terms that we can appreciate. Well, even like the one about the women in the Book of Mormon.

Connie: 15:59 I mean, it was amazing to me to think about Sariah that they wouldn't ride camels because they were just barely above a servant. And then they would have walked all day, and then they would put up the big tents, and then they were the ones in charge of putting up the fire, I mean, doing the fire and the food and everything. And I'm thinking, and then she's pregnant out in the wilderness, and I'm thinking, Oh, my word!

Connie: 16:17 And she was not a young thing! So, wow, it just put things in perspective. And let's talk about that for a minute because you have a beautiful series where you have all these main people in the scriptures: “Abinadi”, you have “Deborah”, “Ammon”, a bunch of them. And they're fantastic. Loved “Deborah”, especially, because we don't hear so much about her, and she is phenomenal. But how do you work that with trying to create a potential setting and potential things that the people who want fiction would appreciate? And you always kind of throw a little love story in there, right? To make sure that that's kind of in there. 

Connie: 16:50 How do you?... I notice, like, even in “Deborah”, there was more of that at the beginning, and then there was the actual experience that was very forthright. It was pretty much right out of the scriptures. So how do you navigate that?

Heather: 17:05 Every book’s a little bit different. So you brought up “Deborah” and “Deborah” is more of a two-part book. So I felt like, okay, she was a judge in Israel. She was obviously educated. She was respected. Most importantly she was called of God. Because as a woman in Israel, like you said, they didn't even really have rights of a servant. And so she obviously was going to be called of God and then everyone in the country, all of her people, would respect that and honor that.

Heather: 17:31 So I thought, okay, so what part of her life led up to this? Really the most fictional part is the first half of the book where we get to know her as a young woman, and she has a lot of brothers and she has a dad. Her mother is not in the picture. And then I thought, well, her husband, and this is another thing I had talked to my dad about: 

Heather: 17:51 Do you think she was married? Do you think she had children? How old? Was she like 25 or was she like 45? And so we talked through all those things and obviously we're both speculating, but my dad has a much better foundation to speculate than I do. And so we both agreed that she had been married and she had already had children and the children were maybe young teenagers, which then the Lord said, Okay, now you're ready. You can take time away from raising your children to be in this judge role. 

Heather: 18:19 And then also from the scriptures, we know that there was this huge war and that the military commander, he wasn't exactly following the inspiration from God. But Deborah knew what was going to happen and so she ended up having to go and be kind of the figurehead in this big battle.

Heather: 18:37 And so, then I thought, okay, so I feel like I had two stories I needed to join. And there'd be a time jump in a year. So I didn't want to skip out on how we see Deborah grow and develop and have her testimony strengthened. And how do you have that responsibility given to you by God that would influence an entire country?

Heather: 19:02 So, obviously there's an outline in the scriptures, but then you have to look at the character. And that's the thing I really learned in my critique group is, you know, what's their motivation and what's their background? And how does their character arc develop, and how do they go from being just a young girl living in a tent with their father outside of the village to now becoming a judge and spiritual leader of Israel, for her whole country.

Connie: 19:25 I love it. And I think that is such, it's such a difficult thing to jump into, but it made sense. As I'm reading, I'm thinking she was this young woman who had a whole history and she was a person. And I think that's the whole goal of doing historical fiction, that we try to see ourselves in the story and see them in that experience and see ourselves in there as well.

Connie: 19:46 So, we have a warmer kind of connection to them. So let's switch gears for a second because you go from scriptural novels–you are such an amazingly talented woman and writer–that your mind can shift the gear. And for those that are listening, I'm sure we can appreciate, that is a difficult thing for an author to do and to do it well in more than one genre. What switched you over to romance and then to historical romance where you have a whole different time period, never mind contemporary? So, take us through that journey. What happened with you there? 

Heather: 20:17 Oh, so I had been writing Book of Mormon fiction and inspiration non-fiction, and then I started writing biblical fiction because I felt like when I wrote “Abinadi,” “Alma” and “Alma the Younger” and “Ammon,” I thought how many A names are there?

Heather: 20:32 How many A name prophets? I said I could write about Aaron, but I felt like, obviously to me, cause I had been so deep in the research, I kept them straight, but I feel like my readers might not keep them quite as straight as I was. So I wanted to change from the Book of Mormon, but still write scripture fiction.

Heather: 20:47 And so in the Christian market, there is a lot of scripture fiction on women in the Bible. And I had read some of it and it just wasn't, like… You know, having this scholarship father, I couldn’t just ping off questions. I felt like there's a lot of things missing that could be there. So that's why I chose to do that. But, you have to remind me of your original question.

Connie: 21:09 So, how did you segue into romance from historical fiction? 

Heather: 21:14 So I had been writing in this genre and then I had a group of really close friends: Josi Kilpack, Julie Wright, Annette Lyon, we were all, you know, very involved with things like conferences together. And we would do writing retreats together. 

Heather: 21:28 And we had always said it would be so fun to write something together, we didn't know what. And so it came up that we would–because they were mostly writing contemporary, like, Julie Wright and Josi, they're writing contemporary, and I know Ann Lyon had done both.

Heather: 21:43 And I had just at that point been published in historical, but I was fine to try contemporary. So we came up with the idea of “The Newport Ladies Book Club”. And it ended up being nine books that we wrote together and it’s this book club, and they all go through all these challenges together. And it's just really a sisterhood that they become, grow out of this book club.

Heather: 22:02 So then what happened is this was, my book, I think, was coming out, my first book in that series was coming out in 2012. And this is when indie publishing was really starting to grab a hold. We had had the big recession and economic crash, especially with publishing and then Kindle came and Amazon came.

Heather: 22:21 And so I had a lot of friends starting to indie publish books that they had never been able to sell for years and years. And so I just thought, Maybe I should indie-publish something because when my book–it was called “Athena”, the book club book–was coming out, you look at Amazon and you see historical, all these historical novels. And all of a sudden “Athena”.

Heather: 22:41 So, if someone reads it and likes it, there's nothing else for them to buy from me unless they want to go to the other side of what I write. So that's why I was even considering that. I thought I could just self-publish something because I could write it in a couple months and then put it out a couple months later.

Heather: 22:56 So it could come out the same time as my “Athena” book, and I'll have more books available on Amazon. And the reason I even was thinking about this is I had other friends kind of doing this as well. And so at my critique group, Annette Lyon and Sarah Eden, they were excited about that idea. So we decided to kind of form this anthology series.

Heather: 23:15  Because I thought, well, you just get kind of tired of telling readers, Buy my book, buy my book, buy my book! It’s all about me! Look at my face! Yay! And so I thought, well, if we did anthology, then we have Annette Lyon’s and Sarah Eden’s. We have their readership coming to read it. And then we decided to do stories and write anthology and it create a theme.

Heather: 23:34 We all write to the same theme, and the stories are only 50-page stories, but we put them together so it makes a full book. And so that started the “Timeless Romance Anthologies”. And that really started me writing my first romance ever. I hadn't really read romance for a long time until I was in this critique group, because then I was reading my critique group members romances.

Heather: 23:55 And so I thought, I got to understand how to create this romantic tension and have that be the PA arc instead of, you know, we're fighting the Philistines next week. It was a learning… Even though I had romance in my other books, it wasn't the main plot or wasn’t the main tension in the book.

Heather: 24:17 So it just started little by little, and then after a couple of years of doing apologies, I decided to write my own. It's just a contemporary small-town romance series. And so I did that. But now I’m back to writing… I don't know, I haven't done a full romance novel for at least a year, and I'm just mostly back in historical. And historical is, like, my happy place, I think. 

Connie: 24:39 That’s your sweet spot. 

Heather: 24:40 Yeah, it really is.

Connie: 24:42 And I love that you allowed yourself to foray into that. And again, I see that dynamic of involving other people. And I think you were innately genius about that because with that connection with the other women, you get their expertise and their perspectives, and then, like you said, readership and things like that.

Connie: 25:00 So those that are listening can see the benefit of connecting with people and that their skill level was a little bit above yours, in different areas. And that's a great way to form a critique group. And you look at those things, I mean, in those stories, you guys covered some really intense problems.

Connie: 25:16 They were very forward-thinking. They were very, I think, prescription drug addiction was one of the issues that one of the women had and blah, blah, blah. Anyway, it wasn't just your cute little boy meets girl, I’m happy. So I think that's amazing that you were able to do that through so many books and then be able to switch gears again to happy, light romances. So, this is amazing!

Connie: 25:37 Let's segue to one more thing. Now that you're back around here, you have your most recent book out “The Slow March of Light”. And before that you had “The Paper Daughters of Chinatown”, which was incredible. These are two–they're based on true stories.

Connie: 25:52 They're incredible. And I think you even went to San Francisco and saw, for “The Paper Daughters of Chinatown”, where they were keeping the women. Tell us what that is like for you researching these emotionally charged true stories, making sure getting that right, getting those things correct.

Connie: 26:09 But also, these are hard things to read. Conveying that in a way that–again one of your other geniuses–taking these topics and then putting it in layman's terms and helping it to be shared in a way that resonates. What do you do with that? How do you approach that? 

Heather: 26:22 Well, I think that's a really good question. So, “The Paper Daughters of Chinatown”, when I agreed to write it–I had actually pitched some other books to the publisher, and this is the Shadow Mountain–and they came back with the idea to write a book on Donaldina Cameron who worked at a mission home that helped with the rescue of the Chinese girls from human trafficking in San Francisco, early 1900s. 

Heather: 26:44 And so I thought, well, if the committee already likes this one and are already excited then I'll agree to write it. And I had looked her up, and I thought, wow, she did amazing. She basically ended up working until she was in retirement serving these girls, and I'm going to court for them, getting their rights back.

Heather: 27:01 And I just thought, wow, she's incredible. But of course I had no idea, because when you talk about human trafficking or the slave trade, the sex trade, especially when you're talking about young kids and girls, it was just, it's heartbreaking just to even think about it. And then when I did my research was just these stories of intense cruelty.

Heather: 27:22 But in my book, because I was writing for Shadow Mountain, I knew I didn't want to do anything harsher graphic. I wanted the story to be inspirational. But yes, we know what's going on because human trafficking still goes on today. So I want it to be like, let's use Dolly Cameron as an example, how she fought against it, and what can we do in our own lives?

Heather: 27:44 So what I found, though, is… So, I only had one kid at home at the time ‘cause my next oldest, she was on a mission and then my other two were out of the house. And so, in my mind, I thought, oh, I just have so much time on my hands. So I had literally told my…my agent and I had talked about me doing this women's fiction series next.

Heather: 28:05 And so I had said, well, I’ll just work on… ‘cause for me, I can't work on the same thing all day, ‘cause you just get burned out and foggy brain. So I said, well, I'll just work on this paper daughters book, you know, in the morning or the afternoon. And then in the later afternoon, after things are settled down with the house, I can work on this lighter. 

Heather: 28:25 And it didn't happen ‘cause I was so emotionally drained. And I found that I would have to be done by like two or three in the afternoon with my paper daughter's research or writing, whatever I was doing. So by the time I went to bed I could sleep. 'Cause it really, it took like hours for it to get out of my system. And for me to feel like, oh, I can be Heather again.

Connie: 28:48 Wow!

Heather: 28:49 The other thing that was hard is I couldn't really talk to someone about it. And, I mean, I do have a lot of little writer groups I’m in, so I can mention some things, but what am I going to say, you know, when I read this really hard scene and experiences this cute little girl went through.

Heather: 29:08 I mean, I can't just throw an email out to my editor. Oh my gosh, I just read this, ‘cause it just was so out of context. And so I really had to just keep so many of those emotions just to myself. And even times when I had to share things with my husband, he's like, Well, maybe you shouldn't be writing this book or maybe it's too hard emotionally. But I felt like, you know, I need to finish. It's just...

Connie: 29:30 …getting through the hard stuff. Yes. And once again, being able to share this in a way that we, like you said, can be inspired. We can be looking to say, How can I help with this so that we don't replicate this. And that was in the early 1900s. I think that is an incredible point to make.

Connie: 29:48 And now with your new book, this is based on someone who was a spy. And, I mean, the intense never knowing what's happening and what's going to happen. How do you navigate being able to deal with that, you know, the intensity of that, of this other way. It wasn't with the same topic, but now this other way. 

Connie: 30:08 How do you…, especially when you're dealing with political things and that's another sort of a minefield. You have to kind of be careful about that. How do you navigate political things and that kind of intensity and that genre? 

Heather: 30:25 Yeah. So, with this newer book, “The Slow March of Light”, I started writing that at the very beginning of the pandemic.

Heather: 30:31 Of course, I didn't know how bad it was going to be and how much everyone was going to be shut down. But the man it's about, his name is Bob Inama, and we were supposed to meet in person, and we had scheduled that for like middle March. And of course we all know what happened March 2020. And so we ended up meeting first over video call, and one of the challenges was that he had not told his story to his family members until…except for just recently.

Heather: 30:28 And when his family found out, one of his children is the one who contacted Deseret Book and said, Hey, my dad has this amazing story and we just barely learned about it. And so I knew he had been through a lot of trauma and he had also not shared it. And so the hard thing about that is I felt like he's telling me stuff for the first time that he's never shared with his family.

Heather: 31:26 So how am I going to write it? But he was so just humble and sweet. And I would send him chapters to look at. I sent him lists of questions and I’d say, You don't have to answer these. Because I don't want to be the trigger of something that he didn't want to remember. And sometimes he would say, There's some things I wanted to forget, or I don't remember, which to me, was just saying, This is not something I want to talk about.

Heather: 31:58 So even when I was writing, he ended up getting sent… He's with the U.S. Army. They sent him into East Germany to be an undercover spy, act as, like, he's an American university student. And he plots targets for the … Cold War that's going on. And then he sends back the coordinates to his officers.

Heather: 32:19 And then he ends up getting arrested by the Soviets and put into prison. And so even the prison scenes, I was just asking him about the prison, and he would say things and I thought, Well, how do I write it, though? Am I really going to go as deep as he's saying, ‘cause he was beaten every day.

Heather: 32:34 And then how is he going to feel when he reads it? So those were, like, the hard things. And so when I finally finished the manuscript, I sent it to two beta readers that had served in West Germany and the army as well, but they are a little bit later in the 70s. Bob was in the early 60s when the Berlin Wall went up. And so they read it and gave me feedback.

Heather: 32:56 And then I finally sent it to Bob. I printed it off. I mailed it. And he only gave me one correction back. He said, Well, you put the wrong initial for my father. But, it just shows how humble he was. And he had told… His wife had read it, and I think one of his daughters read it too, in advance. And Bob had felt like I had captured, like, his personality and his character. 

Connie: 33:25 What a gift. Heather, that is such, I would say, the greatest compliment to a writer that is doing that kind of story. That is the only correction, that he felt that you captured it. For you to not even be there and yet to do it in a way that could be digested with other people, right?

Connie: 33:44 That they could take that and really experience it in a way that was doable. That is incredible. And I can't even imagine, again, what both of you went through. And you having gone through that paper daughters experience, being able to understand how he must've felt not being able to share pieces. And what a sacred space that you two must have shared with that, of both understanding what that story meant and the telling of it meant.

Connie: 34:11 And I think that is a huge stewardship of an author is not just getting in and like getting the deadlines done and getting it out there. But the treatment of the whole process, especially when you're involving another person and their story. That is just beautiful the way that you approach that. That leads me to, how have you, as we're wrapping this up, how has your faith helped you to be able to deal with this writing journey, those intense moments, those nuances that you wouldn't know yourself, the ups and downs, the highs and lows, the learning and the weaknesses and the strengths and all the things. How has your faith helped you move forward in this writing journey? 

Heather: 34:53 I think, honestly, my faith and praying a lot, has helped me, like, just make the decisions one day at a time. Because I think our time really is sacred. Like you, I’m a mom and there's a lot of things to juggle and you want to be there for the most important people in your life when they really need you.

Heather: 35:12 And so, when I do pray about my writing time, I don't know if that sounds hokey or not. 

Connie: 35:18 I do too! No. I think most people would agree.

Heather: 35:20 Yeah, I feel like, okay, I'm going to write for a few hours, or whatever, in the afternoon or in the morning. And I want this writing to count. I want it to be where I'm doing my very best in this moment, because at 12 o'clock I have to go help in my daughter's class and probably wouldn't get back to the computer for another 24 hours. And so that's always been a prayer in my heart many, many times.

Heather: 35:43 Also just to have the Spirit with me so that I can approach a story respectfully, especially when I'm taking these true stories, whether it's biblical or for someone that's still living. And also be open-minded and not be… I guess be open-minded to correction or revision and not feel offended or too protective, or like, you know, my writing is so perfect or whatever, cause it's not.

Heather: 36:11 And I know that it's not at all. But I do definitely use my faith and prayers so that every writing session or every writing opportunity I have is going to be well used. And that way… ‘cause I think a lot of us would always feel like we're being pulled different directions all the time. And so even though writing is my job, it is my career, I still have my other things I love to do and that are important to do. 


Connie: 36:36 That's so fantastic. And I know I've talked with you, our daughters do volleyball and I've asked you volleyball questions, and you're over there typing at a volleyball match. 

Connie: 36:44 I just love it. I just think it's fantastic that you have been able to weave in the writing and the mom thing and all the things, and just like those that are listening are trying to do as well. And being able to validate each of those pieces and prayerfully approach that. One last question on this, as far as [00:37:00] this realm.

Connie: 37:01 How has that affected you working with a national agent? Because you have an agent. Is she back in New York? I think it is. Is that right? Yeah. Has that ever come into play or is that ever been a thing where you've had some experiences with that, of this intersection of faith, creativity in that professional skill?

Heather: 37:17 So my current agent, she has one daughter and her daughter's a little bit younger than mine. But every time we talk or email, we always talk about our families. And she also is Christian, and I've had other agents that are Jewish. And so, it's really cute because they always, they want to talk about family and religion, which is surprising to me because, you know, we're different religions. But I just let them, and I haven't ever felt put down or anything. I just have always felt really welcomed, I think in general, most people are very welcome and loving once you get to know them. 

Connie: 37:52 I love that. And I have no doubt that your experience with so much scriptural history can help you understand that Jewish faith and have commonality. And there is so much in common between religions, especially with faith and family, and that there's just that, you know, those cornerstones.

Connie: 38:07 So I think that is fantastic. As we've been talking today. the different people listening, they're all at different stages of their writing: want to write, they are writing, they're down in the dumps, they're in the highs, and they're in the throes. Is there any bit of advice, the one last thing that maybe you haven't been able to share that hasn't come up? Is there one last bit of advice that you would want to leave with everyone today? 

Heather: 38:28 Oh, yeah. For me, the big thing is just perseverance and set goals. Always have a backup plan so you don't have to eat too much ice cream after the rejection. But I always say, Okay, this book, I’d love this book to be published here, but if not, then I have backup plans for it. 

Connie: 38:43 That's so fantastic. And this has been so inspiring to me today because I think life can get busy and carpool and work and all those things. And you can just shove those little dreams that are just percolating inside and shove them to the side and think, Well, that's just a fluffy thing. But this is such…we feel called to do these things, and the Lord can use us if we'll seek what it is He wants us to do with it.

Connie: 39:06 And then give us the know-how of how we can make that happen. You have shared beautifully today how to do that. Heather, thank you so much for being with us today. 

Heather: 39:15 Well, thank you so much. It's so fun to talk to you just in general. 

Connie: 39:18 I feel the same way. I almost feel like the after-party, like we can go for another hour!

Connie: 39:23 If people want to get a hold of you, which I know they're going to want to, what's the best way for them to reach you? 

Heather: 39:28 Oh, I mean, social media I'm on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter. I do have a website. It’s hbmoore.com and you can contact me through email there. 

Connie: 39:37 And so many resources. There is so much good stuff. Do check that out. It is just fantastic. 

Connie: 39:42 As always such a joy and a treat, and we wish you every good thing. Take care! Thank you so much everybody, today. We appreciate you joining us. We would love it if you love this to rate, review, and subscribe. And also check out our other interviews with other speakers and authors and media personalities that are going to help you move forward in your journey and in your ability to find the intersection of faith, creativity and professional skill.