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"Rich in biblical allusions and symbolism, ... the standout to me is McLeod's focus on the gathering of women to share memories of Jesus, a communal space for women where storytelling reinforces faith and offers comfort. Although the outcome is well-known, the journey to get there is both powerful and affecting, beautifully conveyed through McLeod's skillful writing."
-- Jamie Michele, Readers' Favorite Reviews
The Day After His Crucifixion weaves together the lives of the women who followed Yeshua the Nazarene when they gather the day after His crucifixion to comfort one another with personal, heart-felt stories of how the Promised One changed their lives forever.
Eavesdrop on their inspiring conversations and learn behind-the-scenes details of Yeshua's baptism, the Cana wedding feast, and other New Testament events, and discover afresh the power of His love.
ISBN-10: 1662955510
Publisher: Front Porch Publishing (April, 2025)
Length: 164 pages (paperback)
The Day After His Crucifixion is available in print at Amazon and Barnes & Noble. Take a moment to add it to your Goodreads list.
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About the Author, Merikay McLeod
A Midwesterner by birth, Merikay McLeod spent most of her adulthood in northern California where she worked as a newspaper reporter, magazine editor, newspaper columnist and freelance writer. Her articles and stroies have won state and national awards, Her freelance work has appeared in such magazines as Good housekeeping, MS, Sunday digest, Insight, The chronicle of Higher Education and many others.
Her walk with Jesus is expressed most accurately by the 23rd Psalm. She has long pondered Jesus' respectful treatment of women despite the surrounding culture's view that women were inferior. The Day After His Crucifixion is her first fiction book.
Interview by Jodi M. Webb
WOW: Merikay, congratulations on your biblical novella The Day After His Crucifixion. What inspired you to write about the lives of the women who followed Jesus Christ?
Merikay: Two concepts inspired this book: The way Jesus treated women and the women themselves.
Jesus, known originally as Yeshua, was a first century Palestinian Jew. At that time and in that place, women's lives were greatly restricted. Their value was measured in the number of sons they birthed and the kind of household they ran. While it was very important for men to study scripture, women were not allowed to study sacred texts. There were all sorts of cultural and religious taboos concerning the interaction between men and women. For example, men could divorce their wives, but women could not divorce their husbands. And men were specifically prohibited from speaking to women in
public.
And here was Yeshua the Nazarene, something like a rock star with huge crowds following wherever he went, ignoring the taboos. He freely interacted with women, taught them, and welcomed them as his followers. In fact, women were the first to whom he told that he was the Messiah. And a woman was the first to see him after his resurrection.
Considering that patriarchal society, it is shocking that within the gospels there is no preaching on the status of women, yet there are several stories of Jesus' public encounters with women. In these encounters, he treats them with dignity, respect and compassion. He relates to them as equal human beings rather than sexual objects. He is interested in them as persons.
How must that have felt to the women who were used to being considered inferior or worse?
WOW: You are definitely coming at an ageless story from a new viewpoint. What led you there?
Merikay: I loved college and over time I earned graduate degrees in Women's Studies, Sociology, and Spirituality. All of those years of study kept me thinking about the women in Jesus' life and ministry.
Later, well into my career, I realized that many of my colleagues knew little about Jesus or the world he lived in. They were curious but did not want to go to a church to find out more. After years of deep reflection and research, I wanted to write about Jesus and the women who encountered him. I wanted to introduce readers to the Jesus I had come to see in the gospels. But there have been so many books written about him, how could I say anything original?
I decided to introduce Jesus through the eyes of the women who encountered him. There would be no religious jargon in my book. I wouldn't even use the name "Jesus" but rather his birth name, the name everyone in his life knew him by -- Yeshua. Yeshua the Nazarene.
This book would not be a theological study. It would be a collection of stories. Women's stories. And where to start? Well, nothing draws friends and colleagues together to talk and remember, to laugh and cry, like the death of someone they love. So I started with Yeshua's crucifixion, and let the women take it from there.
WOW: What was the most challenging part of writing this book?
Merikay: Trying to imagine the authentic thoughts and feelings of each woman. Trying to get the story right, so that the reader would also share the feelings and thoughts, the memories, the life-altering experiences. Every time I read another book or study, more concepts about the culture or about women
in the culture flooded me. So, trying to keep the stories brief, the way we share stories with each other, was a struggle. I hope I was able to give each reader a genuine experience of the time and place and people involved.
WOW: At what point did you consider yourself a writer?
Merikay: When I was 14 or 15, I often spent my after school time at the city library. Kalamazoo City Library was a mile or so from our home. I'd walk there after school, and spend time searching the stacks for something interesting to read. Usually I searched the shelves in the young people's room, but one day, just out of curiosity, I wandered out into the grown ups area and began perusing the stacks, just looking at the various titles.
On an upper shelf, a small, orange book caught my eye. Standing on tiptoe, I pulled it off the shelf. It was entitled: How to Write and Sell Fact and Fiction. I don't remember the author's name, but I remember the impact that title had on me. I suddenly realized that people got paid to write. That you can make money writing.
The world I lived in offered girls very little in the way of employment. You could clean houses and you could babysit. Baby sitting paid 35-cents an hour. A pittance, even in those days. And suddenly I realized I could earn money writing.
I loved to read and I'd often written little stories for myself. But now .... with my new found knowledge, I saw doors opening. I checked out the book, took it home, read it, and it changed my life.
One of the librarians introduced me to the magazine The Writer. It was in the adult periodical area of the library. It was full of articles about how to write for publication. And in the back were several pages describing what kind of stories and articles various magazines wanted.
I became an earnest and enthusiastic student. The book How to Write and Sell Fact and Fiction along with the magazine The Writer, became my teachers.
I began submitting poems and articles and stories. And it wasn't too long before I started receiving checks for my work. In the beginning I wrote little verses for religious magazines. I also wrote stories for children's Sunday School or Sabbath School magazines.
I learned that I could sell the same story to several different religious magazines, as long as the magazine's markets did not overlap. I could sell the same poem or story to a Catholic magazine and a Methodist magazine and a Baptist magazine and a Mennonite magazine and a Seventh-day Adventist magazine, and then the amount I earned per written piece was fairly significant.
You asked when I considered myself a writer. It was back then when I was a teenager, submitting my work to church publications and newspapers.
WOW: How did you writing grow from that young girl with a little book in the public library?
Merikay: As I grew older, it was my writing that opened employment doors. I worked in the PR department of the first college I attended. There I learned how to write press releases, and text for university brochures. A publishing house hired me to edit narratives. I freelanced for national and regional magazines writing on social justice issues and fascinating people. I became editor of a weekly newspaper. Then of a woman's business magazine, and eventually went to work in the communications department of Santa Clara University, and later the communications department in UC Berkeley. When I left the San Francisco Bay Area to live in the Gold Rush Mother Lode of California, I worked as a daily newspaper reporter. My work won state and national awards.
After retiring from paid employment, my husband and I began traveling the world and it was only natural to write about those journeys. We wrote six breezy travel memoirs under the byline of Al & Sunny Lockwood. Some were published independently, some by traditional publishers.
WOW: What do you find most rewarding about your work?
Merikay: Today I can look back on more than 50 years of writing and publishing. And all I can say
is that there are so many rewards to writing that I think it beats any other kind of work. Here are four rewards I can think of right off the top of my head:
1. The work itself is rewarding. The researching. Meeting outstanding individuals and interviewing them. Then, shaping a story that's never been told before. Or highlighting an idea that's never had the exact exposure you're giving it. Creating something that's never existed before is deeply satisfying.
2. Being paid for your work, receiving financial acknowledgement for something you alone created is most gratifying.
3. Seeing your work published in magazines, newspapers, journals or books is its own reward.
4. Receiving letters or emails from readers who love your work and want to let you know it, is another wonderful reward.
WOW: What do you do when you aren't writing?
Merikay: I'm almost always writing on something -- a manuscript, a story, etc. I'm also often researching markets that might welcome work from me. But when I'm not writing or thinking about writing, you can often find me watching a house remodel show on HGTV. Or swimming in the
community pool. Or traveling with my Sweetheart husband. We have traveled by car, train, plane and cruise ship. Have visited dozens of UNESCO World Heritage sites, as well as most of Western Europe, just about every state in the Union, much of South America, Canada's Maritimes, as well as Istanbul, Ephesus, and other fascinating places.
WOW: If you could give our readers one piece of writing advice, what would it be?
Merikay: If you enjoy writing, keep doing it. Don't get discouraged by rejections, learn from them.
Also, if you get bored with your work, try your hand at a different kind of writing. I've spent my career producing nonfiction. Now I'm trying something different. The Day After His Crucifixion is my first attempt at fiction. And I'm very excited about it.
WOW: As are we! And I think we should all take Merikay up on her challenge to try something different in our writing.
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