About

Hi there!

I’m Savannah. I’m an author, illustrator, history enthusiast, and, most importantly, a follower of Jesus.

I write stories with a hearty dose of hope, truth, and beauty, plus a dash of humor. While I’ve experimented with a variety of genres, I especially love writing true stories and accurate historical fiction that points readers to the hope of the kingdom of heaven and reminds them that God is good, light is greater than darkness, and every life is precious.

I’m the third born in an amazing family of seven children and was homeschooled all the way through. I live with my family in beautiful western Montana, deep in the forest, surrounded by mountains. Besides writing, drawing, reading, and researching, I love spending time with my family, my dog, Brielle, and my family’s other Bernese Mountain Dogs, working on the family homestead, going on adventures, enjoying God’s creation (both here in this beautiful place we live and on trips to the coast!), getting together with old friends and meeting new ones, watching good movies, and cups of hot tea.

Some of my favorite books:

The Hiding Place by Corrie ten Boom with John and Elizabeth Sherrill
Bonhoeffer: Pastor, Martyr, Prophet, Spy by Eric Metaxas
Surprised by Joy by C.S. Lewis
The Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis
The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien
Journey Through the Night by Anne DeVries
The Auschwitz Escape by Joel C. Rosenberg
Trusting God by Jerry Bridges
The Cost of Discipleship by Dietrich Bonhoeffer
God’s Smuggler by Brother Andrew with John and Elizabeth Sherrill
Return to the Hiding Place by Hans Poley
Things We Couldn’t Say by Diet Eman with James Schaap
Twice Freed by Patricia St. John
The Bronze Bow by Elizabeth George Speare
War in the Wasteland and The Resistance by Douglas Bond
Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Montgomery

I’ve also had the joy of connecting with many fellow indie authors! Here are some whose books I’ve greatly enjoyed:

My writing journey

While I’ve enjoyed writing and making up stories since I was a wee little lass, I began writing seriously and wrote my first full-length novel when I was fourteen. It was a fantasy story set in a medieval world of dragons, elves, dwarves, and giants, featuring a red-haired princess named Ariana. I didn’t publish that book and don’t plan to, but it still holds a special place in my heart!

Also, when I was fourteen, God opened my eyes to the tragedies of modern-day slavery, abortion, and the plight of orphans and foster kids, and gave me the desire to do something. And so, I wrote the book I wished I had to read. I wrote a nonfiction book with information about slavery, abortion, orphans, and other issues, full of stories of people from history and people today who rescued “the least of these,” and a long list of practical ways anyone, including teens and young people, can make a difference. That became the first book I published in early 2017, when I was seventeen. Eight years later, I released a revised and expanded edition under the title Do Justly, Love Mercy, Walk Humbly.

After writing Do Justly, I wrote another fantasy. This one is called The Invisible Guide and was published in 2018. It’s set in a kingdom ruled by a tyrant, where the few who hold to belief in the Creator and read The Forbidden Book often pay for it with their lives. It follows a girl named Brielle who sets out on a dangerous journey across a desert with her younger siblings, not knowing that their trek will awaken an evil that has long been asleep. I don’t remember when I first came up with the idea for this story, but I certainly drew a lot of inspiration from The Chronicles of Narnia, The Hobbit, and The Lord of the Rings.

In 2019, I co-wrote a children’s book with my mother about my younger sister Sadie and her journey with epilepsy, The Girl With the Big Blue Eyes. I found that many people don’t understand what epilepsy is, and I wanted to explain it in a way even young children can understand. So I wrote and illustrated a rhyming children’s book that tells Sadie’s story, educates people about epilepsy, and shares the truth every one of us is created in God’s image. My mother wrote a section for the back of the book, sharing more details of Sadie’s journey and giving the special perspective of a mother.

And also in 2019, I began writing the genre that I think I’ll be sticking with for a good long while: historical fiction.

Years earlier, while listening to the song “Thief” by Third Day, I had come up with the idea to write a story about the daughter of the repentant thief on the cross beside Jesus. But that story idea got pushed to the back burner, until… fast forward several years: my family was in the process of moving to another state and living in a fifth-wheel camper for the winter in a little town in Northern Colorado at over 10,000 feet elevation. While enjoying cozy times in our camper during that winter, we watched a lot of movies. One of the movies we watched was the 2016 version of Ben-Hur. Now that movie certainly isn’t perfect, but watching it rekindled that desire in me to write a story set in the first-century Roman Empire, and I remembered my idea from years ago to write a story about the thief’s daughter. In the end, the thief’s daughter became a side character in a three-book series set during the reign of Emperor Nero when the early Christians were persecuted and killed in the Roman arenas. It’s called A Torch in the Empire Series and focuses on a Jewish brother and sister, Jesse and Abigail, and a young Roman soldier named Lucas, and the adventures, trials, and tests all three face.

My most recent book is Trains and Tulips, a historical fiction set in the Netherlands during World War II, inspired by true stories of the Dutch Resistance. I first came up with the beginnings of this story after watching the movie Return to the Hiding Place (it’s an excellent movie, but I wouldn’t recommend it to young children, and be aware that there is a bit of disturbing/upsetting content in it.) As you see, watching movies can have quite an impact on me! After nearly five years of researching, brainstorming, writing, and editing, Trains and Tulips was finally finished. The book follows five main characters: Pieter (a theology student) Marit (Pieter’s sister, an artist), Gerrit (a young farmer who’s engaged to Marit), David (a Jewish veterinary student), and Elsje (a teenage girl whose life is turned upside down by a Jewish baby). When I first began the book, I didn’t intend for the goodness of God to be the main theme, but as I planned and wrote, somehow the truth that God is good, always, became the main message of this story. It’s definitely my favorite of the fictional stories I’ve written thus far.

Head over to my Books page to learn more about my books!

And, Lord willing, I’ll keep writing! I have more World War II historical fiction in the works that I’ll be sharing more details about soon.

In all of my fiction, you will find:

A strong biblical Christian worldview. I don’t try to force Christian elements into my stories, but Jesus has changed my life, and that naturally comes through in my books. To quote one of my heroes from history, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, in Jesus I have found “the life that is life indeed,” and that life is portrayed in my stories. My books feature Christian characters who pray, read Scripture, talk about God and their faith freely, and wrestle with difficult moral and spiritual questions. I also represent other belief systems and contrast them with biblical Christianity. While I am non-denominational, in my historical fiction, I aim for historical accuracy in the beliefs of my characters and what church traditions they are a part of. So, for example, Trains and Tulips is set in the Netherlands during World War II, and most of the main characters are members of the Dutch Reformed church because the vast majority of Protestant Christians in the Netherlands at this time were Dutch Reformed. In a story I’m working on set in Germany, the main characters are Lutherans. While I may disagree with these denominations on minor points of theology and practice, we agree on the most important things. (Head over to the “What I Believe” page if you want to know more about my core beliefs that come through in all my books.)
Heroes who are ordinary people, with flaws and weaknesses, yet display extraordinary courage, faith, and self-sacrifice. I believe we need heroes, people we can read about and say, “I want to live like that.” I love books that feature characters who, while they’re not perfect, I can look up to them and want to live with those same qualities.
Strong family relationships. While of course, my characters don’t do it perfectly, honoring parents and grandparents and being best friends with siblings and treating them with love and kindness is promoted.
A focus on action and adventure, not romance. While I’m certainly not opposed to marriage or all romance, I think there’s far too much of it in Christian fiction, and I prefer stories focused on action and adventure. Many of my books have no romance at all, and in the books that do feature a romantic couple, their love story is not the focus. If there is any romance at all, you can be sure that it will be pure and God-honoring. A hug is the farthest any physical affection will ever go, and I don’t include thoughts of physical attraction.
Historical accuracy. I’ve published one fantasy, but the rest of my fiction is historical, and I plan to stick with this genre. I will literally spend years researching, reading every book I can get my hands on about the time period and place I’m writing about. My plots are built around the real historical facts, the characters are inspired by real people, and historical notes in the back of the book tell you which parts are real and which spring from my imagination.
Clean and wholesome content. I do write about darkness, evil, and sin. I write about slavery and abortion and war and genocide and persecution. But I don’t focus on those things. I focus on the characters who are taking a stand against these evils. My books do include violence, some more than others, because there is darkness and evil in this world, and I don’t believe we should pretend it doesn’t exist, but rather expose it and contrast it with light and goodness (Ephesians 5:11). However, I don’t go into excessive graphic detail. Often, the crimes are only mentioned or implied, not actually shown. Content guides for each of my books on their pages give more details of what is in each book. And while I like to talk more about what is in my books rather than what’s not, my books do not include any foul language or graphic depictions of immorality. I grew up listening to my parents read books aloud to my siblings and me, and my goal is to write books that families can enjoy together.
Humor. I love to laugh and am a firm believer in finding joy and humor even in serious situations. While my books certainly aren’t comedies, you will find wholesome humor interspersed throughout.
The value of human life showcased. I believe God created humans in His image, male and female, and therefore, every man, woman, boy, girl, and baby, born and unborn, has great value. I write about times when human life was disregarded, when people were killed or enslaved because of their ethnicity, their beliefs, or their disabilities. And I write about characters who fought to rescue them, even at great risk to themselves. I desire for my writing to be a voice for those who too often have no voice–the unborn, the disabled and those with special needs, the elderly, the persecuted.
Always hopeful. And one of the things I love to do most in my writing is always, always communicate hope. Even when things are dark, there is always hope. In my books, you’ll find characters who never give up hope, who keep trusting God even when they don’t understand why He allows the suffering, and who look for glimmers of light and beauty wherever they are–admiring the stars from a prison cell window or enjoying the song of a bird and the glories of the sky from behind the barbed wire of a concentration camp.

“Blue Flower Story Company” is the name I chose for my book publishing imprint.

A blue flower symbolizes hope, beauty, and longing. C.S. Lewis used it to represent the German word “Sehnsucht,” which means a deep longing or yearning. He applied it to the longing for Heaven, for Christ.

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