The author's journey – Why four authors wrote their books
At my recent book launch party, I held an Author’s Journey Spotlight section. I asked four of my clients to showcase their books, tell us why they wrote them and I thought you’d like to hear their stories.
The Author’s Journey – Let me introduce my four authors.
Helen Monaghan
Helen Monaghan is the author of Successful Business Minds. Aimed towards business owners who want to both serve others and create a sustainable business, Helen’s book blends psychology, finance and spirituality to help you to improve your relationship with money.
Why did you write your book Helen?
I’ve come across so many business owners in a dilemma over a belief that they have to choose between their heart and their head when it comes to money. I once did too. But there is another way. We can have a passionate, exciting, meaningful life, still make money and have a successful business that helps lots of people. All we need to do is make friends with our mind. Once I grasped this, and then so did my clients, our businesses and lives transformed.
What was the single most important lesson you learnt on the journey?
I remember getting an ‘aha’ moment when I read the first couple of chapters of Your Book is the Hook. I had been trying to write about everything except the one thing that I was good at in my business! It was so simple, yet so powerful. Additionally, talking about our book, even before we have published it, helps our elevation speech. The more we passionately talk about our book, the more our ideal client understands what we do.
What was the one thing that you wish you’d known when you started out on your author’s journey?
It is possible when you find the right support, ask for help and gather together your team. For as long as I can remember, every December I would reflect on my achievements that year and assess what I would like to have happen the following year. Each year was the same; to publish a book from the material I had written. It wasn’t until I found Karen before I realised why it had never happened before. Having support is crucial to creating a successful book that is aligned to your business.
Jeremy Glyn
Jeremy Glyn is the author of The Inside Track. Encouraged by former Olympians Steve Backley and Roger Black to write it, Jeremy’s book is for aspiring athletes and their coaches. Using a combination of coaching, kinesiology and psychology, it gives practical examples and tips to improve their mental strength and show how the mind works to achieve greater sporting success.
Why did you write your book Jeremy?
The integrated coaching approach that I have developed “takes sports psychology to a new and more powerful level” – at least, that’s how it was described by a current Olympian and recordholder.
I have often said that if I was to die without training others how to work with this approach, it would be a terrible waste.
Once 2 Olympic silver medallists urged me to write a book about it, I realised it was time to get started.
What was the single most important lesson you learnt on the journey?
Think through: who you are writing a book for, what you want them to get from it, what you want to happen as a result of them reading it – then you can plan how to structure the chapters.
What was the one thing that you wish you’d known when you started out on your author journey?
How long everything else takes! By ‘everything else’ I mean getting the website developed, the proofreading done, the typesetting done, the cover done, and the proof copy printed and checked, before you actually get a book in your hand!
Ellen Watts
Ellen Watts is a trainer, coach, speaker and author published her first book Cosmic Ordering Made Easier: How to get more of what you want more often was published a few years ago, and she joined me for the 10,000 word challenge last year. Ellen is now well on her way to finishing her second book and already has 50,000 words down on paper.
Why did you write your book Ellen?
I wanted to share the skill I’d developed over 30 years, and specifically honed into a formula in the last 7 years, with as many people as possible. I really wanted to make something that was often portrayed as mystical, complicated and woo woo, and make it easier and more down to earth so that anyone and everyone could do it.
What was the single most important lesson you learnt on the journey?
I don’t wish I’d done anything differently for that one – but now I know so much more. Something I will definitely do for the next one is do even more marketing before the launch and even more pre-sales – I will also pay a lot more attention to the power of Amazon.
What’s been your biggest success to date?
There have been many, including winning Author of the Year 2014 at the Women inspiring Women national awards. But one of the most lovely, because it came only one month after the launch, was Coty UK asking me to speak on Cosmic Ordering for a group of 40 journalists from magazines including Elle, Cosmo, and Vogue, at the ME Hotel in the Strand, at the product launch of ‘Hope in a Jar’ night cream. Every journalist was then given a pot of the night cream and a signed copy of my book, and then they stayed for a sleep over at the hotel. How did they find me? The marketing director googled ‘Cosmic Ordering’ and liked the look of my book on my website – wow! They paid me well, bought 40 copies of my book on their Amex card, and gave me a press goodie bag with goodies worth over £300 – it was a fab, fab, fab night!!
Peter Clarke
Why did you write your book Peter?
There are three reasons:
a) To highlight the various challenges faced by small business owners on a daily basis and the effects this has on the way they write and communicate with their clients.
b) To provide ‘comfort’ in that they are not alone with these challenges and that there are people out there who can provide support.
c) To offer my own help by way of a simple process plan that I have used effectively in my writing career.
What was the single most important lesson you learnt on the journey?
Apart from getting into the habit of writing every day, having a robust plan of the book and to stick to it.
What was the one thing that you wish you’d known when you started out on your author’s journey?
Why did I procrastinate for so long? Just get on and do it – it’s a hugely satisfying thing to do and to see your name on the front cover as the author is reward for all the hard work.
What did you get from doing the 10,000 word challenge last summer?
- The need to write every day;
- Set an achievable target of, say, 500 words a day (one side of A4);
- Exceeding that target once the creative juices start flowing;
- Realising how easy it is to go off at a tangent when writing and the importance of having a robust plan to bring you back on track;
- Valuable knowledge of the publishing process.
- Enhanced credibility as a proofreader/copy editor
I really enjoyed hearing these fabulous authors speak!
Thank you also to everyone who contributed to the book hamper raffle prize:
Success University for Women by Susan Treadgold and others
The Wealthy Woman by Mary Waring
Find your Thing by Lucy Whittington
How to be really productive by Grace Marshall
iSell: Unlock your winning sales mindset by Leigh Ashton
Key Person of Influence by Daniel Priestley (donated by Susan Payton, The Business of Mums)
A lovely bundle of business books donated by Steve Bimpson
And the books donated by my spotlighted authors.
The hamper was won by Mavis Kerrigan.