new website

My personal website has a new look.

My daughter, Teri Burns, owner of LoneMesaPublishing.com updated and streamlined it now that I don't have clients to showcase there or agent information and links to show. The same link www.terryburns.net now goes to the new page or it also has a www.terryburns.us link where the site is actually located among the websites that she manages. She did a nice job on it and we are still tweaking it. It is one of the author services that she offers to writer clients that want to contract with her for assistance.

I am retiring, but still may do a little consulting for writers under the umbrella of Lone Mesa and maybe help her with a little overflow work. It's like trying to quit smoking, I can't really quit "cold turkey."

I'm going to put an auto-respond on my Hartline email address to keep me from having to send the same message to all the submissions that continue to come in, to point them to the agency submission guidelines and to point out the contact information for the other Hartline agents.

Technically I am still on board through the end of October but I have ceased to do many of the functions and I am taking the time to wrap things up. Yes, I told agent friends that I know I am under no obligation to help clients find a new home, but they are more than clients, they are friends. So I am doing what I can to help them make the transition.

The new header on the website is going to go up on my personal facebook page as well at https://www.facebook.com/TerryWayneBurns.  My author facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/TerryWayneBurnsAuthor?fref=ts Teri also handles but it got a facelift recently and is not being impacted right now.

Yes, I do plan to see if I can still write and plan to work through Lone Mesa for that endeavor as well. I favor what my Western writer friends call "Christian westerns" that a log of my female readers do like but which will hopefully reach out to male readers, particularly nonbelievers.

So I'm in the midst of a lot of change and covet your prayers, but I am still here at the same old email addresses. Just another chapter in the unfolding saga of my life.

Time to Retire

I retired from a career in chamber of commerce management after more than 25 years service.

I retired from working with a community service organization after more than ten years service.

I’ve been with Hartline for over ten years, seven as an agent. After much prayer and discussion my wife and I have decided it is time to retire yet again.

It’s not been an easy decision to make. I have a great group of clients that are together in an online group where we talk daily. They are more than clients, they are good friends. Doing this agent gig has been something of a mission effort for me. I have had a heart for trying to help debut Christian writers get started, whatever it took. Seeing them get their work out has been very satisfying. Of course focusing on debut writers has not been very rewarding financially, but that was a decision I made.

I’ve seen a number of clients move on to other things after I helped them get started.

But it has required a huge investment of time and effort as well as a lot of stress. To tell the truth even though I will miss it, making the decision brought an immediate feeling of relief. I told Joyce it would be effective November first which will give me a couple of months to wrap things up and to try and help my clients get placed elsewhere. A number of them will be picked up by other Hartline agents.

I owe Joyce a debt of gratitude for helping me get started as a writer, serving as my agent. Further she allowed me the opportunity to be an agent myself. I’m very grateful for her help and for her believing in me.

I am going ahead and making the announcement this far ahead to keep people from continuing to submit to me when I am no longer taking submissions. For much of the time I have been working in this role I have attended a couple of conferences a month and received thousands of submissions allowing me to meet quite a large number of writers in person or on paper.  It is an amazing thing having friends spread all over this country. It has been a real blessing.

My daughter and a couple of my clients are hosting a “virtual retirement party” over on my facebook page. Leave a comment here or drop by there and sign the “virtual guest book.”

God bless you all . . .

Terry