A Syllable of Water: Twenty Writers of Faith Reflect on Their Art

A deep well of practical and inspirational wisdom for every Christian writer

Imagine you have the chance to spend an hour or so alone with a couple of well-published writers. Imagine they share with you secrets of their art, and reveal how their art relates to their faith. This is the experience awaiting you with the twenty-two authors of this book.

In A Syllable of Water, some of today’s leading writers of faith reflect on all aspects of the writing vocation and process in ways that will inform and inspire.

Philip Yancey, Richard Foster, Luci Shaw, and others discuss everything from the tools of a writer to the ways that they spend their time when they are not writing.

Editors such as John Wilson (Books & Culture) and American Book Award-winning Cherokee poet, Diane Glancy, reflect on the value of the editor-writer conversation, as well as the power of revision.

And other writers of stature including Doris Betts, John Leax, Erin McGraw, Harold Fickett, Virginia Stem Owens, Jeanne Murray Walker, Scott Cairns, and Eugene H. Peterson offer sage advice on how to approach nearly every imaginable genre from fiction and nonfiction to memoir, poetry, and translation.

Editor Emilie Griffin is the author of several books, including Small Surrenders, Doors into Prayer and Wonderful and Dark is This Road. She is a founding member of the Chrysostom Society, a group of distinguished writers who meet periodically to discuss matters of faith and writing.

Emilie Griffin is the author of several books on the spiritual life, including Clinging: The Experience of Prayer; The Reflective Executive; and Spiritual Classics, a collaboration with Richard Foster. She lives in Alexandria, Louisiana, with her husband, William Griffin.