Dana Corbit this week

» Posted on Jun 30, 2008 in Blog | Comments Off on Dana Corbit this week


I’m on vacation so I don’t have a winner drawn yet for Jillian Hart’s book. When I get back I will draw a winner for Jillian’s book, Her Wedding Wish, and Dana’s book, Homecoming at Hickory Ridge.

If you want to be entered in Dana Corbit’s drawing for Homecoming at Hickory Ridge, please leave a comment with a way to contact you (an e-mail address) or email me at margaretdaley@gmail.com. This drawing will end Sunday evening, July 6th.

Dana Corbit’s bio:
Dana Corbit started telling “people stories” at about the same time she started forming words. Her love for those stories – whether true or enhanced – and the words that formed them was immediate and enduring. In elementary school, the Kokomo, Indiana, native proudly carried the nickname, “the poet who didn’t know it,” and earned the “Best Creative Writer” award in her fifth grade class. Already, she was hooked on writing. By high school, Corbit had turned her attention to journalism and served as editor of the Taylor High School newspaper and teen writer to the Kokomo Tribune.

After earning her bachelor’s degree in 1988 from Ball State University where she worked four years on the college newspaper, Corbit joined the staff of The Republic newspaper in Columbus, Indiana. In her career as a reporter and, later, features editor, she indulged her first love of storytelling by writing articles about amazing everyday people. Her work earned state and national recognition. When she left the workforce in 1992 to be a stay-at-home mother, the only things she couldn’t leave behind were those stories. She continued writing a newspaper column and wrote freelance articles for regional and national magazines.

It was during this new phase in her life that Corbit discovered the joy of writing fiction. While her daughters napped or after their bedtime, she wrote her earliest manuscripts. She discovered that the characters born in her imagination could share some of the same diverse qualities as those whose stories she once retold in newsprint. Her characters open their lives to her in the same way her real-life interview subjects did: through their dreams and failures, their joys and their faith.

Even as her family relocated in 1995 to Milford, Michigan, Corbit continued writing manuscripts and became involved with the Greater Detroit chapter of Romance Writers of America to hone her fiction-writing skills. She remained dedicated, even after second move in 1999 brought her family to Grand Rapids, Michigan, where she became active in the Mid-Michigan chapter of RWA.

That dedication paid off in 2001, when Corbit sold her first inspirational romance, A Blessed Life, to Steeple Hill Books for its Love Inspired imprint. Since Corbit hopes readers will find hope and healing through her books, it was only right that her debut novel was a healing journey for the writer herself. Corbit, like the story’s heroine, has a daughter who lives with the chronic illness, juvenile rheumatoid arthritis. (Her child is now enjoying life in remission.)

Since the 2002 publication of her debut book, which was selected as a finalist in the HOLT Medallion competition, sponsored by the Virginia Romance Writers, Corbit has published five additional titles with Steeple Hill Love Inspired and has also written a novel for Guideposts Books through its Tales From Grace Chapel Inn series.

Corbit now makes her home back in Southeast Michigan, where she balances the fictional realm of her characters with her equally exciting real-life world as a wife, volunteer, carpool coordinator for her three athletic daughters and food supplier to two disinterested felines. Active in her local church, she also remains involved in her two Romance Writers chapters. When she isn’t working on a new book or cheering on competitors on the soccer field or at the pool, she enjoys curling up with a book, bicycling with her family and running for recreation and reflection. In 2004, she completed her goal of running a marathon.

She loves hearing from fans and may be contacted by mail at P.O. Box 2251, Farmington Hills, MI 48333-2251. Visit her web site at www.danacorbit.com.