Welcome to Early Foundations Publishers’ first newsletter! In this newsletter we will introduce you to Aileen Mol and her new book, Thoughts for Saturday Night. Join us as we ask Aileen a few questions about this book and about her writing in general.
Who influenced you to begin writing?
Already as a young child, I admired my mom, Mrs. Alie Vogelaar, and her great gift of writing children’s books. I loved reading them, as well as many other books, and a few times when I was very young, I started jotting chapters into a notebook, but I never continued or finished them. As teenager, I entered a few writing contests. During my first year at college, I was asked to write an essay about my favorite author. I wrote about my mom. My professor liked it and succeeded in convincing me that I should try to write, too. I wrote my first book, Flight from the Enemy, when I was nineteen, and I was completely surprised and excited when it actually seemed “good enough” to be published.
Later, I began to see the great need for morally sound, valuable children’s books. I thought back often to my years as a little girl in the Netherlands when there were so many Christian books to choose from. As my two little boys grew, I began to feel this need more and more, and I wanted to try to write something worthwhile, something in which children would recognize their own families’ lifestyles and which would bring out a message about what is important. So often as parents, you have to take your child’s book and cross off a few bad words or explain why a certain chapter is unacceptable. This brought about Jake and Jimmy and the Secret Wishes and The Hasty Promise. I knew I could not do much in comparison to the great need for good books, but I hoped that in addition to my little contribution, other and more talented people would also do so. I would love to see a great number of authors from our own church circles write children’s books!
A long stretch of time passed in which I did not write, often busy with my growing family, sometimes just not sure about writing anymore. Eventually, The Wonder of Christmas came about, which I wrote thinking back once again to my childhood years. I had the privilege of reading many fiction stories which focused on the true meaning of Christmas, and I could not find such a book in the English language for my own children. I tried translating my mother’s Dutch Christmas books aloud to my children at bedtime, but my mind just didn’t work fast enough. I wanted not only my own children but children everywhere to have a book about the wonder of Christmas.
After this came Thoughts for Saturday Night.
Where do you get your ideas for books?
Many of the ideas are just from my imagination, but woven into all stories are small events, happenings, characteristics, and feelings from either my own family or my own youth.
Why did you write Thoughts for Saturday Night?
As a family, we end our week on Saturday night by reading a few things together before singing a psalter and closing with prayer. I’ve often struggled to decide what to read. Some things are too difficult for children, other things too lengthy, and I couldn’t seem to find much to choose from. When a family has children of many different ages, it seems that a daily meditation is suitable for the older ones while it would be nice to read something to the younger ones in addition to this, something they can truly relate to and think about afterwards. I had written some short portions for the “Timothy,” and we decided to start reading those to our children.
When I had written quite a few of these short stories and thoughts, I thought, “Perhaps it could become a book; other families might find them useful too.” I remember reading the little book Bible Doctrines Simply Explained over and over as a child, often on Sunday afternoons. I liked the little stories in it. How impressionable is a young child’s mind! I feel I cannot and do not know how to write anything at all about the truths in God’s Word unless the Lord will help me, and yet I also know that the Lord is able to use very simple means to speak to the heart, also of a child. I hope that, through the work that Early Foundation Publishers does in publishing children’s books with good values, children will think about these things by times and bow their knees quietly by their beds to ask for the “one thing needful.”
After some hesitation, I compiled fifty-two portions, added Bible and psalter references as well as questions to answer, and sent them away to Early Foundation Publishers for publication.
How did you come up with the various topics?
The topics in Thoughts for Saturday Night often came to me by surprise. Sometimes, I was somewhere and saw something in nature, and I thought, “That’s a very big rock,” or, “Those lambs are certainly staying close to their owner,” and in a moment, I would think of something I could write to children about this in a way that relates to a Biblical topic.
I might simply have been at home and heard the canary sing or watched one of my children and think, “That little bird’s heart is full to bursting. Maybe I can write something about songs and music in the Bible,” and, “My daughter certainly was excited about that phone message. Perhaps there is a thought in that about the true message of the Bible.”
It also happened that I was reading a book, sermon, or periodical and just a few words or one simple sentence led to a big thought that just wanted to put itself into writing. Something would just strike me and make me think, “I didn’t know that!” or “I never looked at it that way!” Sometimes I have had to stop what I was doing for a moment or turn the light on again in the bedroom at night to jot down a few quick notes.
How many books have you written? Which one is your favorite?
I have written five books, three of them fifteen to twenty years ago and two of them in the past five years. My least favorite is The Hasty Promise since I feel much more comfortable writing for young children rather than young teens. I think I enjoyed writing the topics for Thoughts for Saturday Night most of all because of their subject matter, especially because I lacked the wisdom and knowledge and learned much from them myself as the thoughts opened up to me.
Are you writing any books now?
Yes, I just finished writing a book, but it has not been proofread or approved yet, nor would it be any fun to tell about it before anyone is able to read it!
What is the hardest part about writing a book?
Truthfully? Writing a book is hard when you doubt it will ever really become a book! I sometimes give up and mostly feel surprised when it is complete, is accepted, and goes into print. In other words, finding the time to write and thinking the book will turn out all right in the end are two things that often hinder me.
What do you enjoy about writing?
I enjoy writing for several reasons. I like doing something different from regular household work, and I like putting my thoughts on paper. I enjoy reading what I wrote aloud to my children and then hoping that other children will one day like reading it too. Most of all, I have an underlying wish that I will be enabled to thread a valuable lesson or message through the story, although I feel deeply that without the Lord’s help, I cannot do this.
What do you want your readers to walk away with after reading Thoughts for Saturday Night?
I hope that children will read the Bible passage that goes along with each topic. That is most important of all. I hope that, if their dad reads it to them on a Sunday afternoon, they will answer the question at the end of each topic because it might help them remember what they heard. I hope that, if children read it together with their families on a Saturday evening, they will sing the psalter together that is placed with each topic. I hope that, although it is but a very simple book, the Lord will be pleased to use it to His honor and the benefit of the readers.
I imagine a boy or girl curled up on the sofa or stretched out on the rug, reading the book, and maybe it will help him or her remember that the next day is Sunday, the most important day of the week. Perhaps for a little while, other thoughts will flee away. I hope that something will stick in the memory of a boy or a girl, something to think seriously about, but most of all, I feel that all our small efforts are not worth anything at all if they are not blessed by the Lord.