Friday on Kitchen Chat: Rachel Hauck!

I'm thrilled to meet our guest on Friday, author extraordinaire, Rachel Hauck! And, don't miss the amazing recipe Rachel has shared with us for the show - Béchamel Sausage. Wow.

About Rachel: Rachel Hauck's stories are filled with twists and turns that leave the reader breathless and longing for more.  She is a fresh fiction voice that's sure to stir hearts for God.

Debbie Macomber - #1 NYT bestselling author

I wrote my first story about a girl and her pony when I was ten. It was handwritten in a spiral notebook.

My second story was about a girl who wanted to move away and live in New York City. I was twelve and no one had ever heard of “chick lit.”

I laughed when I found that incomplete manuscript in an old box-o-stuff. I told my husband, “I was born to write.”

Words fascinate me. I love putting them together and dialoging with the characters who live in my heart and mind. I carry on conversations with them while driving down the road or sitting on a bike in Spin class.

People are as fascinating as words. I love hearing personal stories of romance, tragedy and triumph. I’d love to hear your stories, too, if you care to write to me. I’m always wondering “what if” about the human condition and see what string of events might develop into a new story.

My life as been molded by the encouragement of my parents and teachers, and by the places I’ve lived like Ohio, Oklahoma, Kentucky and Florida, and the people I’ve met along the way.

Readers ask, “Is any part of you in your stories or characters?”

The answer is always yes. All of us are impacted by the places we’ve been and the people we’ve met, if only for a moment. As a writer, those exposures show up in the stories I write.

After graduating from the Ohio State University with a degree in Journalism, I traveled as a software trainer. From California to Maine, I experienced the beauty and heart of America and our people. In countries such as Australia, Spain, Venezuela, Mexico, Ireland and Canada came to see how people are just people. We all want the same things: love and happiness, laughter, faith and safety, and a bit of prosperity.

Those experiences make up the tapestry of my stories. Life-like characters that, by the book’s end, get in your heart and make you want to spend time with them over a latte or Diet Coke.

Looking back, I believe I’ve always written. If not in my journals or stories, in my heart. I was constantly taking note of the sights and sounds around me, the emotion of a moment: dinner with friends, the last night in college before graduation, racing through an airport to catch a flight to Australia, talking about Jesus with my translator in the back of a cab as we drove across Madrid.

Now, my days are spent mining those life experiences and emotions so I can share them with you through the eyes and ears of my characters and the places they live.

In ’92, I married my best friend, Tony, and spent over eighteen years in youth ministry with him. We love to read and go to the gym, and laugh at the antics of our pets.

A year later, I started my first novel, an epic WWII story that eventually found some light as a sub plot in my book Love Starts With Elle..

With the help and cheering of writing friends I met through American Christian Fiction Writers where I served as President and now as an Advisor, my first book was published in 2004, the same year I left the corporate world to write full time..

Since then I’ve become an award winning, best selling author of twelve novels with more to come. It’s my desire for you find hope and escape in my stories, and inhale a bit of the fragrance of Jesus’s love.

About Dining With Joy: Joy Ballard has a secret: she's a cooking show host who can't really cook.

When her South Carolina-based cooking show, Dining With Joy, is picked up by a major network, Joy Ballard's world heats up like a lowcountry boil.

Joy needs help. Then she meets chef Luke Davis who moved to Beaufort after losing his Manhattan restaurant. A cook at the Frogmore Cafe, he's paying debts and longing to regain his reputation in the elite foodie world.

Luke and Joy mix like oil and water…until Joy is exposed on national television. With her career and his reputation both under fire, they'll have to work together to fix the mess. Is it possible that they can learn to feast on God's love and dine with joy?

Win a copy of Dining with Joy when it releases in November! Leave a comment (HERE) (with your email address) - I'll draw one name at random and notify the winner via email.

Labels: kitche

posted by Margaret McSweeney @ 12:49 PM