Who is Ramona K. Cecil?

 Hi! I’m Ramona K. Cecil, and I’m thrilled to be part of the Christian Fiction Historical Society. So, you may ask, who is Ramona K. Cecil?

            First and foremost, I’m a Christian and a child of God. I’m also a wife, mother, grandmother, poet, and inspirational romance writer.

            Though a child of the “baby-boom” generation, mine was not the iconic suburban American childhood of the 1950s and early 1960’s. Instead, I enjoyed exploring the fields and wooded streams around our rural Indiana home. My mom was a homemaker and my dad worked at a diesel engine factory some thirty miles from our little five-acre “truck farm”. My chores included feeding the chickens, helping plant, weed, and harvest a large vegetable garden, rick (stack) firewood, and even drive a tractor. I grew up feeling very close to the Indiana soil.

Me at 18 mo.(seated) sister, Jane, behind

            Creative writing was part of my birthright and came as easily to me as breathing. Both my parents were poets who had met in Indianapolis years earlier at a writers group called the Poets Corner. They encouraged me and my siblings, an older sister and younger brother, to read and appreciate the written word, but I was the one who got the “writing bug”. I remember my parents reading aloud to us, most often from the Bible and the poems of Hoosier poet, James Whitcomb Riley.

            In this fertile environment, my imagination and poetic tendencies emerged early and were encouraged. While swinging on the ever-present tree swing my dad would newly fashion for us kids each spring, I’d take in the bucolic scene around me. The rhythmic motion of the swing blended with my burgeoning appreciation of God’s handiwork and childish poems extolling nature’s beauty bubbled from me in four line rhyming verse. These, I learned from my mother, were poems. Since I hadn’t yet learned to write at the age of four, my mother jotted down the little ditties for me. Over the years, I composed literally hundreds of verses, most of which, whether for good or ill, have long been lost.

            Many hours of my childhood were spent nestled with a book in the sturdy branches of a favorite “climbing” tree. I discovered the stories of Hoosier author Gene Stratton Porter in whom, I found a kindred spirit. I simply devoured her books. Laddie was my favorite. That book still makes me both smile and weep.

            During my school years I became known for my poetry, some of which, won awards in national contests. Though I continued to write my “Helen Steiner-Rice style” verses after I married and became a young mother, I never considered my writing anything more than a hobby. Then after reading a poem at church one Sunday, I was invited by a gentleman in the audience whose job was to acquire verses for a Christian gift company to submit something to them. I did, and they accepted it. That began a decade-long association with the company; writing approximately ninety inspirational verses that appeared on all manner of gift items.

            Though a voracious reader, I’d never attempted to write a novel, or even a short story until a visit in the mid 1980’s to Conner Prairie, a living history museum in central Indiana. There my love of story, Indiana history, and romance seemed to blend in a kind of tinder bundle. Sparked by my imagination, the bundle blazed into an idea for a prairie

romance novel.

            People ask me how long it took for me to write my first book and I tell them “twenty-three years.” Whenever the muse struck and time allowed, I’d pound out a little more of the story on my old electric typewriter, then pitch the manuscript back into the drawer. I probably re-wrote the story three or four times over the years.

            In 1999 after both our two daughters left home and my husband and I became empty-nesters, I dragged out the raggedy manuscript. Deciding to “get serious” about my writing, I bought a computer and typed my story onto it. A desire to actually see my story in print began to grow in me. After revising the story yet again, I began writing more stories; another novel and three novellas. I knew I needed help. I couldn’t do this alone. Praying for God’s guidance, I Googled “Christian romance writers” and found the group American Christian Romance Writers, which later became American Christian Fiction Writers. There, I found the help I was searching for; critique groups, online writing classes, and willing hands and hearts eager to help me realize my dream.

            It took several years, a lot of hard work, sweat, and tears, but in 2005 my historical prairie romance story that I’d titled Larkspur, won the Vintage Romance Inspirations Contest and was published the next year by Vintage Romance Publishing. Two years later, my next three stories, Sweet Forever, Everlasting  Promise, and Charity’s Heart were accepted and published by Barbour Publishing’s Heartsong Presents line. These three were re-released in 2010 as part of Barbour’s Romancing America series in a volume titled Freedom’s Crossroad. About this time, I was blessed to be accepted as a client by literary agent, Tamela Hancock Murray now of the Steve Laube Agency. With her professional help and guidance, two Christmas novellas with Barbour Publishing followed; To Hear Angels, part of A Woodland Christmas, and Simple Gifts, part of A Quaker Christmas. In March of 2012, Barbour Publishing released my first full-length story, A Bride’s Sweet Surprise in Sauers, Indiana. That story is scheduled for re-release July, 2013 in a volume titled Great Plains Brides where it will be coupled with another story in Barbour’s Brides/Wedding series by author Erica Vetsch. To date, my latest release is another Heartsong, Heart’s Heritage set, no surprise, in 1812 in Southern Indiana county. I will be giving away a copy of Heart’s Heritage as part of our group’s March giveaways that include a Kindle.

            I don’t know where my writing journey will take me, but I continue to write my stories that celebrate both romance and the history of Indiana, trusting God with the road ahead.

You can read all about my books on my web site at www.ramonakcecil.com where I have links to their Amazon Books pages.