Guest blogging over at International Christian Fiction Writers this morning, but here’s a sneak peak…

There’s something attractive about authenticity.

People crave the real thing.

Being real is engaging. Being real is endearing. Being real is essential.

But at the same time, another force exists. Working against authenticity, against real, is another concept.

Imitation.

I see this battle between real and imitation at the grocery store.

At the back of the store, in the refrigerator section, sits a wonderful concoction made of real milk carefully cultured and aged into a magical substance called cheddar cheese. It’s beautifully tangy and sharp and tastes delicious sliced onto crackers or sprinkled over nachos. Melted in a toasted cheese sandwich. Whisked into a sauce to pour over broccoli or other vegetables (can you tell I was hungry when I wrote this post?!?).

On the other hand, sitting somewhere sad and lonely, is a particular product.

In a can.

Bland.

Soulless.

Fake.

This…stuff…thinks it’s cheese, but we all know better. It’s mostly salt, oil, and artificial flavouring with a leetle bit of dairy thrown in as an afterthought—and if you’re a lover of cheese-in-a-can, then I apologise for maligning your very poor taste in snacks. But I gotta ask, why would you choose the imitation when the real thing is so much more…real?!?

The battle between the authentic and the counterfeit area extends to other arenas, too.

Every day, we experience pressure to take the easy way, the fake way. So how can we stay authentic?

For the rest of this blog post, go to –> –> –> ICFW

Jebraun Clifford always wanted to step through a door into an imaginary kingdom, so it’s no surprise she now calls Middle Earth home. Too short to be an elf and too tall to be a Hobbit, she lives in a gorgeous town smack-dab in the centre of New Zealand’s North Island filled with thermal activity, stunning lakes, and enough Redwoods to make her Californian heart swoon. Her unpublished YA fantasy, The Two Queens of Kyrie, won both the American Christian Fiction Writer’s 2015 First Impressions contest and the 2016 Genesis contest. She loves coffee, tree ferns, dark chocolate, and Jesus, and harbours a secret penchant for British spelling.

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