If you’re like me, you’ve lost quite a few friends to cancer. And know several more who are survivors. This month is Breast Cancer Awareness Month, and my guest author, Barbara Britton, is chatting about her own experience. She wove part of her story into a Christmas book, believe it or not. Read all the way through and see if it doesn’t intrigue you.

Breast cancer doesn’t sound romantic. But with 1 in 8 women affected by breast cancer, there are times when romance and breast cancer collide.

I was fifty-one when I was diagnosed with breast cancer. I had a loving husband, and he was supportive as I went through two surgeries and radiation therapy. My husband encouraged me and loved me even when I chose not to reconstruct after a double mastectomy.

God is faithful. I’m writing this blog post as an eleven-year breast cancer survivor.

What’s an author to do after she goes through a cancer journey? Write a book about it, of course. I also wanted to shine a light on how many more women in their twenties and thirties are diagnosed with breast cancer. This is eye-opening since mammography doesn’t usually begin until age forty. I made the heroine in my story, Samantha Williams, twenty-three years old when she is diagnosed with breast cancer.

True love looks at the inner beauty of a woman. In “Christmas at Whispering Creek,” Cole falls in love with Samantha before knowing about her cancer secret. Will that attraction change after he hears that she lost a breast to cancer? Since romance novels must end with a happily-ever-after, you know Cole is a solid guy.

My Christmas romance is fiction, but after the story ends, you will get a glimpse into my personal cancer journey. I wasn’t going to place my story in the book, but God nudged me to use the lessons He had taught me in order to help others.

October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month. I encourage women to do monthly breast checks and to schedule yearly mammograms. Don’t wait to biopsy, or get a second opinion, if something shows up on your imaging. God has blessed us with great strides in medicine.

Some people may have thought I was ill-advised to write a Christian romance with a breast cancer survivor as my heroine. I didn’t know how readers would react to the story, but “Christmas at Whispering Creek” has been a finalist in more contests than any of my other books. I hope you will feel God’s love and peace shine through in a fictional story that begun with a real-life journey.

“Christmas at Whispering Creek.”

All Samantha Williams wants to do is to use her teaching degree to instruct a classroom of second graders. But, after a breast cancer diagnosis at the age of twenty-three, and failed reconstruction surgery, Sam finds herself without a job and temporarily living with her parents. This isn’t the life Sam expected. When a family friend dies and leaves Sam a house and land in Whispering Creek, Tennessee, Sam must decide if leaving Wisconsin for Southern living is in her lesson plans.

Nashville native, Cole Donoven, left his family’ s electrical business to write country music. When Cole’ s song-writing partner and girlfriend dumps him for a country music star, Cole abandons Nashville to hole up in Whispering Creek and compose one more song. The last thing Cole expects to find in the sleepy small town is a deceased friend, estate squabbles, and a Northern beauty. Will the chaos in Whispering Creek help create a bestselling song for Cole and possibly help him find a life-long collaborator?

“Christmas at Whispering Creek” is available on Amazon or B&N, or wherever books are sold. Your library can order it too.

Barbara M. Britton is a multi-published author of Christian Fiction. Her Tribes of Israel series brings little-known Bible characters to light. You can also travel to Whispering Creek, Tennessee with her sweet romance duology. Recently, she launched a Biblical Fiction Bible study that shines a light on Jesus’s ministry. Barbara has a nutrition degree from Baylor University but loves to dip healthy strawberries in chocolate. You can find out more about Barbara and her books on her website barbarambritton.com.

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