Nine years after writing A Rush of
Wings and The Still of Night (Bethany)
featuring brothers Rick and
Morgan Spencer, Kristen Heitzmann
was hiking with an old iPod, listening
to the music she used in those
stories when Morgan invaded her
head again demanding to be heard.
“I came home to write and couldn’t
stop, so The Breath of Dawn was
born,” shares Kristen, “Morgan’s
smouldering, sarcastic, yet deeply
caring and highly entertaining
nature keeps calling me back
for more.”
Morgan is grieving the loss of
his wife when a snowstorm tosses
the reclusive Quinn Riley into
his path and his highly sought
after problem-solving skills are
aroused by her troubled circumstances.
Kristen writes a complex love
story between two wounded
souls, but hesitates to call it a
romance, preferring to describe it
as “gritty relational.” “I think the
most effective element
in a love story is strife.
It provides great
fodder for dialogue and
emotional hooks with
the reader who takes
things as seriously as
the characters themselves—
if they care.
Each must be heroic,
and each must grow;
but that means growing
pains. If things get
messy in the process, all
the better. Faith adds
depth, especially if it’s
a struggling, wrestling
sort of relationship like Jacob had with God.”
Kristen believes Morgan loves more deeply and
cares for more people than many typical leading
men—he is driven to help anyone he encounters with
a problem. She explains Quinn’s response, “Quinn
falls first and hardest because of Morgan’s fierce
and tender love for his daughter, Livie; but she also
sees his vulnerability, his courage in the face of grief,
and—OK—he’s so downright desirable.” The popularity
of such love stories is easy to explain, according
to Kristen: “We’re created in God’s image, and God
is love. The highest commandment after loving God
with our whole hearts is to love one another. The
fact that we do it so spectacularly poorly makes for
wonderfully complex storytelling.”