July News!
Romance, art, and the gift of sunsets and sand between my toes!
This summer has been quiet on my end, and intentionally so. I stepped back from social media, took a breath, and spent some time doing something I hadn’t done in a while. I created things without the pressure of talking about them. It’s a simple joy that I sometimes have to remind myself of.
Of course, a little sun, sand and margaritas at the beach didn’t hurt either.
But I’m back at the farm, working hard to met deadlines and I have some news to share!
Lucky Stall is headed to Woman’s World!
I got the email earlier this week and I’m still smiling about it. My short story Lucky Stall has been accepted for Woman’s World Magazine!
Diane’s car stalls out at a fundraiser car wash, Tom shows up with jumper cables and no agenda, and what follows is the kind of easy, slow chemistry that only happens when two people have already lived enough life to recognize a good thing. It’s warm, it’s sweet, and it is very much a summer story.
Mark your calendars! July 10-16. Grab a copy and let me know if Tom wins you over.
Love, Accidentally is available now.
My short story Love, Accidentally is part of the Micromance Magazine anthology KissMet Quarterly: Dream A Little Dream With Me. You can grab it from Amazon.
Celine’s bad day takes a turn for the worse when a distracted man in a truck gently bumps her car. The culprit, Wes, has a charming smile, an undeniable hero complex, and a story about swerving to save a squirrel. Whether the squirrel actually existed is highly debatable.
Wes shows up two days later with a dilemma. His insurance company doesn’t believe in the squirrel either, and he needs a witness. Celine isn’t about to fabricate evidence.
But Wes is less concerned with his insurance claim than he is with seeing her again. And somehow he keeps showing up, this time with Exhibit A: one very real, bushy-tailed, bright-eyed squirrel named Acorn. It’s ridiculous and charming and I had so much fun writing it.
(I don't know what it is with me and squirrels, but here we are, smack dab in the middle of a full-blown squirrelscapade.)
A new artist name, a new world
This summer I’ve also been deep in a new body of work, a collection called Language of Small Wonders, painted under Billie Shannon. Right now, I'm fully focused on getting these five pieces wrapped, packed and hand delivered for a jury submission.
If you know Mina Beckett’s western oils, you know they’re rugged, wide-open, built on the land and the horse and the horizon. Billie Shannon is something else entirely. Think jewel tones, childhood and the whimsy world of innocence and makebeleive rendered in a completely different voice and tone. Same artist. Completely different soul on the canvas. Mina Beckett Fine Art isn’t going anywhere. She’s still very much here, still very much western, still very much mine. But Billie Shannon needed her own space to exist, and this summer I gave it to her.
The Behind The Scenes Stuff
One more thing. If you've gone looking for Mina's website lately and come up empty, that's also intentional. It's being rebuilt. There are also some things shifting behind the scenes at CurtissLynn Publishing as I figure out the best way to bring all of my creative work under one roof. I'm a creative person with a lot of moving parts, and I need a home base that actually reflects that. I'll keep you posted as those decisions come together.
It feels good to resurface with actual news rather than plans. Thank you for hanging around while I went quiet. Expect more from me in the weeks ahead.
Talk soon,
Mina