Lindsay Nixon repaired a broken relationship with her brother, Collin Adams, by cowriting a series of nine children’s books, titled “A Good Friend Loves.” The first book, “A Good Friend Loves Idealists,” was published in 2021 and the latest, “A Good Friend Loves Peacemakers,” in 2024.
“In 2020 my brother called me and said he was inspired to write a children’s book because Tim Tebow had recently written one,” Nixon recalled. “Collin asked if I would like to collaborate with him. He is a great writer, but I am an elementary school teacher, and he thought my experiences would contribute to the project. It was an incredibly healing journey for both of us to write these books together; our relationship had been fraught for years.”
“We wrote the text of all nine books in just five months, which was doable because we were in the pandemic lockdown,” she continued. “I didn’t have kids yet and he doesn’t have kids either, so we spent a lot of time on Zoom co-writing because my brother lives in San Francisco.”
Nixon moved to Waco in 2011 from Michigan to attend Baylor University. She then got married and put down roots in Waco, teaching at a public school for three years. As a second-grade teacher at Valor Preparatory Academy since 2022, Nixon is passionate about children and children’s literature.
“I love kids and love to spend time with them,” she said. “I love knowing what kids think and feel and guiding them toward loving people and loving Jesus. The process of writing books was a great opportunity for me to think about kids in a new way. I’m a teacher and a parent, so I think about kids all the time.”
“A Good Friend Loves” revolves around Enneagram personality testing, a mutual interest of Nixon and her brother. Each book follows main character Leo, a third grader, as he engages with one of his classmates who are loosely based on one of the nine personality types — the Reformer (Idealist, as titled in Nixon’s series), Helper, Achiever, Individualist (Creative), Investigator (Observer), Loyalist (Worrier), Enthusiast (Entertainer), Challenger (Leader) and the Peacemaker, according to The Enneagram Institute. Leo learns what it means to be a good friend to people who are different than himself.
The series was written to teach kids how to love people of the different personality types, whether it be by words of encouragement or acts of service.
“Enneagram personality characteristics show up in children, and we needed to make the plots relatable to them,” Nixon explained. “We needed them to experience things that could actually happen in third grade. Some of the characters were easier to write than others. For instance, our Enneagram 5 child was challenging because they are observers and usually want to internalize feelings. We had Leo try to comfort that friend who has a grandparent die; that friend wants to be left along. Enneagrams 7, 8 and 9 were much easier to write. It was a really sweet way to dive into what a child might be thinking when reading this book.”
The “Good Friend Loves” books were published using KDP, Amazon’s publishing company. Nixon and her brother chose this route as they believed the process to be easier for publishing novices. For illustrations, they used a company called Fiverr, which is a gig work company. People all over the world can post their projects and have artists respond if they were interested in the project.
Nixon has participated in Fabled Bookstore and Cafe’s Local Author Faire several times as well as the Midway Reads program.
“I recommend the books to teachers and parents as read-alouds for children from preschool through third grade, since that is the age of the main character,” Nixon suggested. “The purpose of these books is to help kids relate to others who react differently to the events in their lives than they do.”
Nixon’s brother recently called her to say that he thought they should write together again.
“I would love to write more books,” she said. “I also think kids should know they can be authors and I want to model that. It’s important to believe they have good ideas and throw them out there. Whether or not the world loves your ideas doesn’t mean they’re not worth writing.”
Even more important than publishing books, Nixon is gratified that the process helped heal her relationship with her brother by going on a shared journey. Nixon believes the Lord brought them back together. Partnering, writing and spending so much time talking to each other helped them realize just how important their relationship is.
