One of the tender mercies in my life lately was that Leslie Householder scheduled another Profitable Author seminar. If you don’t know who Leslie is go to http://prosperyourfamily.com. She did one the very Saturday I held my youth conference last May so I couldn’t go. I am so grateful that she decided to do another one last Saturday. It was cheaper, because it was a commercial in disguise to upgrade to her personal coaching to get ALL the secrets.  But in a way this one was even better because she invited other authors who do different genres than what she does to share their secrets. Leslie does self-help, and she had people there to cover writing for business sales,  fiction, multimedia, and children’s books.

My nursing toddler is finally to the point that I can be gone all day and he is OK with separating from me. I’ve been through seasons where I take my attached baby with me, and now I am in the season where I can leave all kids at home. It’s a seasonal journey.

Another tender mercy was that the seminar only lasted half a day, and so that meant I could buzz on over to Paradigm High to watch my son compete in his Freedom Bowl, which he won. More Pics coming soon.

I missed however, another attraction going on this day, the Eagle Forum Convention, which I always love going to  I have been able to hear from great warriors for freedom at this conference like Scott Bradley, Phyllis Schlafly, and David Barton. So I missed that one but I just got an email saying someone has made DVDs of it so I will catch it there. My mom also went and took notes I hope so I will ask her for them. 

At the seminar with Leslie, first we heard from  Bridget Cook. Bridget wrote Skinhead Confessions, about TJ Leyden, a gang member who walked away from gangs with a price tag on his head, and another compelling book that I will read in my postmenopausal state called Shattered Silence. That one is about a girl who finds out her father is a serial killer. Yikes! Not something I want to read until I am done having babies and not prone to dwelling on harrowing images in my tender progesteronegenic state. Both are true stories. Bridget woke up at 2 AM just after a dream that gave her the plot line for the first story. She started writing page after page in the wee hours. Then later while doing research she discovered a blog by TJ that mirrored point by point what she had dreamed. She dreamt a story that was real! She ended up getting to write the story! She was a an exciting passionate speaker so her writing is probably the same. I really enjoyed her sharing that people can change, forgive, and find redemption. She got to be on Oprah to promote at least one of the books.

Next was Leslie. She announced that her self-published bestselling book Jackrabbit Factor, which you can get free here http://jackrabbitfactor.com, is now published by a traditional publisher in Taiwan and China too. She self published in the U.S. because no one would publish it. She has one rejection letter “bronzed” in her smartphone to remind her that people who reject her can be wrong. The letter was laughable.

She shared that to get a bestselling book, you can sell less than 500 books. She also said that bestselling books aren’t necessarily good books. They are just books that have been heavily promoted. You can do the same with yours, but don’t think you are going to make a million dollars by writing a bestseller. It usually has to lead into something else you sell for you to really make a lot of money.  She used Lightning Source to publish her books. She shared that you can set up an account with them right now at http://lightningsource.com for free with a code. To anyone who comments below and requests it I will give it to you.

I am not going to share all the secrets, you will just have to go the seminar yourself. But I will share more of the seminar in another post, especially the bit about how to get a children’s picture book that Leslie’s sister Valerie did based on the Jackrabbit Factor. We got our kids the book for Christmas last year and have enjoyed it. The blog for that is http://www.oginventswheel.blogspot.com/