Act I: Avoid conflict at all costs. Even when someone signs you up for something you really don't want to do. Act II: Try to hold things together, even when your life is spinning out of control. Act III: (You'll have to read the book to learn how it all plays out.)

Playwright Leah Townsend doesn't think of herself as a doormat. In fact, her life is pretty good. There's the gorgeous and dependable Edward (even if he is a little dull), and her challenging career (even if the last two plays were flops). The trouble is, Leah's feeling restless these days. The new play isn't going well. Her agent is handing out ultimatums. And her boyfriend Edward, who insists Leah "doesn't handle conflict well," has the nerve to enroll her in a conflict-management class full of people she's sure are her polar opposites, including a conservative talk-radio host named Cinco Dublin who thrives on the very thing Leah wants to avoid--making waves. Can a conflict-challenged playwright ever learn to stand her ground...even if life doesn't come in three predictable acts?

Since these words appeared in 2003, Rene Gutteridge has published almost twenty novels and gathered a growing and enthusiastic following. This story follows Macey Steigel, an ambitious urbanite who has returned home to Kansas for her father's funeral after many years away. She intends to return to her big-city career as soon as possible and leave the dismal past buried along with her dad. But the sight of the old farmhouse triggers a wave of memories--and recollections of a painful secret--that she thought she's left behind long ago. A story of love, healing and renewal.

Jason Stephens lives a life of wealth. A life of privilege. A life that's about to take a radical turn. Jason always had a straightforward relationship with his billionaire grandfather, Howard "Red" Stevens. He shunned him but welcomed his money. So he figured when Red died, his part of the inheritance would be a simple cash transaction that would fund his extravagant lifestyle.

Instead, for Jason to receive his inheritance, he's given an ultimatum . . . a series of twelve tests or "gifts" as Red calls them. If he fails at any one of them, he loses everything. If he completes them all, the ultimate gift will be his. One of those "gifts" involves finding a friend . . . something Jason has never experienced before.

Yet this unlikely friendship and an unexpected romance may just open his eyes to what he's been missing all along.

Also included is an accompanying dvd which features a "behind-the-scenes" making of the movie, a music video featuring Sara Groves and the movie trailer.

A Writing Guide for Screenwriters and Authors Are you an author who wants to explore the business of adapting screenplays into novels? Are you a screenwriter who'd like to see your unproduced script written as a novel, to help get your film made? Are you a screenwriter who wants to adapt your own script into a novel? This book is for you. Novelizations used to pump business for existing movies and TV shows, but now a fast-growing trend has publishers contracting authors to pen novel adaptations based on scripts that haven't been produced-yet. At least until the novel raises awareness about the script and gives it a life of its own. It's a win-win for all creative writers. If you are a novelist, you can benefit from learning the craft of adapting scripts into books. You may just end up penning a novelization that will one day be a film. There is an art to this form of adaptation that may differ from starting a novel from scratch. If you're a screenwriter who is sitting on a gem of a script, what are you waiting for? We'll give you tips on how to team up with a novelist. Or you, too, can learn to adapt your screenplay as a novel. Just like screenwriting, there's a craft to be honed. With the whole story and characters of that script already in place, you're half way there. Want to learn the trade secrets of this burgeoning business? Look no further. Using specific, side-by-side examples that compare script pages to novel pages, writing team Cheryl McKay (the screenwriter) and Rene Gutteridge (the novelist) share their experiences, tips, and know-how on adapting scripts into novels. Covering everything from creative technique to collaborative contracts, Novelizations: How to Adapt Scripts into Novels is an invaluable tool for both screenwriters and novelists to successfully master this highly specialized art form. * * * RENE GUTTERIDGE is the one of the go-to authors for novelizations. She has written Old Fashioned, Heart of the Country, and Just 18 Summers for Tyndale. CHERYL MCKAY, screenwriter of The Ultimate Gift (which Gutteridge also novelized), has worked with Gutteridge on the novelizations for her scripts, Never the Bride for Random House and Greetings from the Flipside for B&H Publishing. They won a Carol Award (ACFW) for Best Women's Fiction for Never the Bride. * * * Key Topics: Adapting scripts into books, what is a novelization?, challenges novelists face, script changes, word count, book length, how to paint in the setting, point of view, characters, story expansion, how to structure & plot a novel based on a script, how to handle backstory, interior monologue, characters and dialogue, and forming writing partnerships.

"What girl can't identify with "Never the Bride"? This is a fabulously funny novel with deep truths embedded in its pages." -Kristin Billerbeck, author of" What a Girl Wants
""I admire writers who employ words to paint touchable pictures, likable characters, introducing us to instant friends who lead us to unexpected endings. That's why I love "Never The Bride."" -SQuire Rushnell, author of the "When GOD Winks "books
Eleven Bridesmaid Dresses Don't Lie
Since she was just a little girl, Jessie Stone dreamed up hundreds of marriage proposals, doodled the romantic ideas in her journal with her treasured purple pen, and fantasized about wedding dresses and falling in love. She's been a bridesmaid nearly a dozen times, waved numerous couples off to sunny honeymoons, and shopped in more department stores for half-price fondue pots than she cares to remember.
But shopping for one key component of these countless proposals hasn't been quite as productive-a future husband. The man she thought she would marry cheated on her. The crush she has on her best friend Blake is at very best...well, crushing. And speed dating has only churned out memorable horror stories.
So when God shows up one day, in the flesh, and becomes a walking, talking part of her life, Jessie is skeptical. What will it take to convince her that the Almighty has a better plan than one she's already cooked up in her journals? Can she turn over her pen and trust someone else to craft a love story beyond her wildest dreams?
Cheryl McKay is the screenwriter for the award-winning film "The Ultimate Gift." She also wrote an episode of "Gigi: God's Little Princess, " based on the book by Sheila Walsh, and "Taylor's Wall, " a drama about high-school violence. She's been writing since the tender age of five when she penned her first play. Cheryl is originally from Boston, Massachusetts, and currently lives in Los Angeles.
Rene Gutteridge is a critically acclaimed comedy writer and novelist. She is the author of fifteen novels including the Boo series, "My Life as a Doormat, " the Occupational Hazards series, and the novelization of the motion picture "The Ultimate Gift. "She lives in Oklahoma with her family.

Winner of the 2014 CLASS Reunion Kudos Book Award, fiction category.After the tragic death of Butch Browning's wife, Jenny, four families begin to realize how precious--and fleeting--their time together is. Each is at a different stage in life: Butch is facing single parenthood. The O'Reillys are expecting their first child. The Andersons are approaching an empty nest, and the Buckleys are so focused on providing their children with everything that they've forgotten what they truly need. With just eighteen summers before their children are grown, how do they make the most of that time when life so often gets in the way?As summer flies by, each of these parents must learn about guilt and grace . . . and when to hold on to their kids and when to let go.

Blissfully unaware that Atlantica Flight 1945 from Atlanta to Amsterdam is about to make aviation history, First Officer Danny McSweeney focuses his energies on navigating the turbulent personalities of an eccentric female captain, a co-pilot with a talent for tactless comments and conspiracy theories, and a lead flight attendant with an outsized attitude that definitely exceeds the limits for carry-on baggage.
On the other side of the cockpit door, the unscheduled in-flight entertainment includes a potbellied pig, a jittery diamond courier, and the recently jilted Lucy Meredith, whose personal mantra of "What Would Oprah Do?" will be challenged by the sudden appearance of her ex and his new traveling partner. On her left sits Hank Hazard, whose unusually polite but constant requests-prompted by his covert role as a spy for the airline-test the limits of the crew's customer service.
But as Lucy and the rest of the crew discover, Hank's odd behavior is linked to a quiet faith that may play a key role in the fate of everyone on board. Especially when an unexpected traveler sets this already bumpy flight on a course toward the "unfriendly "skies.

""Knock knock."
"Who's there?"
"
Nobody in Skary seems to know for sure...
It appears that everyone in Skary, Indiana, is having an identity crisis of epic proportions-including the town itself. Once known as the haunt of the world's most popular horror writer, Wolfe "Boo" Boone, Skary started losing tourist business after Boo abruptly abandoned his career. Now the little town with the big marketing hook is up a creek-and on the brink of bankruptcy.
Meanwhile, the former best-selling author is hawking or selling] cars and wondering, like the rest of the world, if he'll ever write again. Yet even as Boo's literary career gracelessly plummets, his fiancee, wholesome Ainsley Parker, is shooting to stardom as the media's darling new domestic diva.
Weave in a dreaming bride with a bargain dress and a few too many pounds on her hips, an unconventional therapist who has Skary in his thrall, a depressed cat, a dogged busybody, and a horde of strange, ghostly figures traipsing in and out of the woods, and it's easy to see why Skary is the quirkiest-and most charming-town around.

Talk about Working out Your Faith with Fear and Trembling.

The biggest thing to happen to Skary, Indiana, is renowned horror novelist Wolfe Boone–or, “Boo,” as the locals fondly call him. For the past sixteen years, the reclusive writer has been the town’s greatest attraction, having unintentionally turned the once-struggling Skary into a thriving tourist-trap for the dark side: from the Haunted Mansion restaurant, famous for its “bloody fingers” (fries splattered with ketchup) to Spooky’s Bookstore (where employees dress like the walking dead).

But when a newly reformed Wolfe suddenly quits the genre and subsequently starts to pursue Skary’s favorite girl-next-door, Ainsley Parker, the little town made famous by his writings becomes truly horrified. Soon, a scheme is plotted to put the fright back into Skary–and get their most famous resident out of love and back into the thrill business.

Filled with humor, small town charm, and a gentle message of enduring faith, Boo shows how even the most colorful group of busybodies and hypocrites can become a community changed forever by God.