Meet Cheryl Grey Bostrom

We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Cheryl Grey Bostrom. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Cheryl Grey below.

Cheryl Grey , we’re thrilled to have you sharing your thoughts and lessons with our community. So, for folks who are at a stage in their life or career where they are trying to be more resilient, can you share where you get your resilience from?

I was ten and an at-risk child from a broken home the summer a buckskin named Sarge threw me. One moment the horse and I were loping in a creekside field on Washington’s Olympic Peninsula; the next, the sky burst with comets as my head and shoulders smacked the earth.

I lay on my back gasping until Sarge nosed me. Without thinking, I caught his trailing reins, toed a stirrup, and resettled my trembling self in the saddle. That’s the moment I remember best: the surprising rush of realization that even after a fall like that, I could climb back on.

Though I didn’t credit God with my developing resilience right then, I later learned that my Creator specializes in rebounds. I believe he got me to my feet that day, just as he has guided me through physical, spiritual, and emotional tests ever since, all of which prepared me for this season as an author of best-selling, award-winning novels. He reminds me of his care in my favorite book: “Fear not, for I am with you; be not dismayed, for I am your God; I will strengthen you, I will help you . . .” (Isaiah 41:10). Though I often feel like that scrawny ten-year-old who isn’t strong enough to hang on, I trust Christ to reseat me and keep me pressing forward.

Great, so let’s take a few minutes and cover your story. What should folks know about you and what you do?

For the last decade, I’ve been a Pacific Northwest novelist and nature photographer writing contemporary women’s fiction in which wild places mirror the heart. I’m fascinated by how the magnificent natural world illustrates our inner landscapes—and I’m delighted when readers so identify with my characters and their stories that they feel heard and known.

Drawn loosely from my own experiences with God’s truth, themes of restoration and hope for both land and hearts thread my nature novels Sugar Birds and Leaning on Air. My newest novel What the River Keeps, in which a reclusive fisheries biologist returns to her childhood home on the Elwha River to untangle her mysterious past, follows suit. Each of the three books fosters rich discussion, and I love to unpack the stories’ layers with book clubs, both in-person and virtually.

These days, I’m immersed in writing my next PNW novel, a dual timeline piece set in Washington’s San Juan Islands. My quarterly column “On Camera: Scripture in Creation” appears in the American Scientific Affiliation’s God and Nature Magazine, and I publish monthly at “Birds in the Hand” (cherylgreybostrom.substack.com) and on my website: cherylbostrom.com.

Looking back, what do you think were the three qualities, skills, or areas of knowledge that were most impactful in your journey? What advice do you have for folks who are early in their journey in terms of how they can best develop or improve on these?

Though I’d spent decades teaching and writing nonfiction, I didn’t take up the fiction craft in earnest until my 60s. Late to the game, I had a lot to learn before I signed with my agent and was awarded a multi-book contract with Tyndale House. Along the way, three practices helped me reach those huge milestones, and they continue to prove invaluable in other areas of my life as well.

First, I cultivated joyful curiosity and a hunger to absorb all I could. An open, teachable posture kept me exploring people, creatures, and wild or rural settings—and how to land them on the page. I also sought help from those more knowledgeable, and I read endlessly.

Second, I embraced challenges, keenly aware of the resilience God would develop in me through them. Expecting difficulties and setbacks, I welcomed them and kept going, trusting his provision in their midst.

Third, I resolved to persevere—and to finish strong. The diligent pursuit of daily and long-term goals kept me on track, and the habit of completing what I began opened remarkable possibilities.

For those early in their journeys, may I suggest these practices?

• Nourish your curiosity (read widely; ask questions constantly).
• Set small and large goals with deadlines you take seriously, but can adjust with grace if necessary.
• Treat setbacks as resistance training—like weights that grow your strength.
• Keep going. Momentum builds a staircase, and the view gets better from every tread.

If you knew you only had a decade of life left, how would you spend that decade?

This question may be more relevant than I’d like to admit. If statistics are true for me, I have roughly 16 years left to live. Statistics also tell me that I can expect a decline in productivity in my old age. Fortunately, I’ve never subscribed to limiting predictions. Instead, I take those stats as a call to action, being deliberate about my choices to love, play, and work at what I believe is God’s call on my life for this time in my life.

So how am I choosing to spend what could be the last decade of my productive years? By following that call to action: loving God, loving others, and working diligently on this assignment he’s set before me: writing stories that bring people hope.

Contact Info:

Image Credits

Amy VandeVoort, Laura Buys, Blake Bostrom

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