Finding HOPE by the book

So the other day, this happened:

And to say we're all a little excited about it is very much an understatement.  If I can drag you away from that super fun cover mock-up for a moment (isn't it great?!?), I have answers ready for your questions. 

WHAT IS IT? 

Hope By The Book is a brand new magazine for avid readers by avid readers (as that nifty graphic would suggest haha)! With that, we're doing what's never quite been done before - creating a magazine to celebrate books (across multiple genres, fiction and nonfiction) AND the reading life for the avid reader, as well as offering smart reviews from industry professionals.

WHAT'S IN IT?

Each issue will have new articles for every reader seeking useful, fun, and inspiring content all about books and the reading life! It will be packed with top notch articles and images that feed your inner bookworm and arm you with great books to grab at the bookstore.  

WHEN DOES IT COME OUT? 

The website is live now, and the magazine will launch November 13th! eep! So excited! 

WILL IT BE ONLY CHRISTIAN BOOKS?

Hope By the Book champions inspirational books, and we exist in large part to help fill the void left in the area of professional reviews of inspirational books when RT Book Reviews and CBA's Christian Market ceased publishing. We also recognize that the definition of 'inspirational' is broad, but rest assured that, as one subscriber recently said, this is a magazine you can leave out for your kids to see and flip through. After all, HOPE is part of our mission statement - and we can't truly pursue Hope in books without keeping close to the Source of all Hope, in our lives and in our content. 

HOW DID IT START? 

Well, that's really what I'm here to talk about today. Because it started with FRIENDSHIP first and foremost. And not just one type of friendship, but rather a cornucopia (if you will) of relationships with two things in common: Jesus & books. To me, this is such a sweet picture of how the body of Christ functions, in a subset of the body with their noses in books ;) I wanted to share some of the friendships that make up this new adventure:

had to 'photoshop' Annie in there ;)

• Friendships formed between book bloggers - a C.S. Lewis 'You too? I thought I was the only one!" type of sisterhood that spans the United States from coast to coast. This friendship circle has become one of the most meaningful of my life, even if we're rarely all in the same room. We pray for each other. We laugh with each other. We cry with each other. We call each other on our stuff. We sharpen each other's rough edges and champion each other's strengths. We love Jesus. We love books. We love Jesus books. And we love each other. When Angelia Stone (more on her in a second) asked me to form a team to get this magazine into readers' hands, these dear book sisters were the first people I asked.

• Friendships that are brand new - Another dear friend of mine - author, agent, speaker Cynthia Ruchti - connected me with Angelia Stone, the CEO of Hope For Women Magazine. Angie has quickly become a sister-friend and she was quick to see the need for a magazine like Hope By the Book. She's held my hand through this whole launch-a-magazine process - and held my feet to the fire a few times too LOL. She's the main boss chick for both magazines, and we just instantly clicked. I'm thankful that God continues to put new friends in my life, to stretch me out of my introverted comfort zone and keep me connected to amazing overcomers!

photo by Emilie Hendryx, CFRR2017

• Friendships within the Christian book community - I'm not naive enough to think that everyone in this industry gets along or always agrees on everything and never struggles with jealousy or hurts. But you know what? We really are stronger together, and the Christian book community is incredibly supportive of each other as a whole. As soon as the magazine was announced, it wasn't just our team's magazine anymore. It was everyone's magazine. Authors, readers, bloggers, publishers, Seekers - people have embraced Hope By The Book as their magazine. And I love it! It IS their magazine. It's OUR magazine - this community who loves Jesus and books and each other. 

And even more than I want to tell you about the magazine and how excited I am, I really want you to have this takeaway - we don't have to do this life thing alone. Not the books you write. Not the books we read & review. Not the blog posts we come up with or the magazine articles we put together. Not the everyday chaos of life, for all its ups and downs in this crazy world. Find your people and do life with them.

That's part of why we created Hope By the Book - to show readers of Christian/inspirational books that they aren't alone. There's a bunch of us out here. Book nerds who love Jesus and read past their bedtime. Who can't figure out the best way to sort their double-stacked bookshelves (by color? by title? by author? by genre? HELP!) and so they just end up triple-stacking them. Who buy candles just because they're based on their favorite books or characters. Avid readers who love books and live books and can't separate the two. 

Now it's my turn to ask you a question:

What types of articles would you like to see in future issues of Hope By the Book?

Comment below for a chance to win a year's subscription (4 issues) to Hope By The Book!!
Open internationally, too.

(If you don't want to wait or you want to go ahead and grab a gift for a friend, you can subscribe here - and use code BOOKISH at checkout for $4.00 off)