Episode 2 of Unshakable, Unbreakable, Unstoppable Stories with Bonnie Jean
Bonnie Jean Schaefer here, author of The Dream Doers and the Summer of Secrets.
I was a senior in college the day I decided to pursue my big dream of being a writer. I bought this blue notebook at the convenience store across the street from the college and started scribbling book ideas in it. Once I had the characters and storyline set, I began writing the first draft in this very notebook.
A year and a half later, I finished the first complete draft. I printed it out and started reading it, certain it was going to be the best book ever.
It wasn’t. Actually, it was really, really, really, really, really TERRIBLE. So I put it aside, bought another notebook and started rewriting the entire story.
Two years later, I had another draft I was certain was good. So I printed it out and read through it. It was better, and by better I mean it was just really, really terrible.
So I put it aside, bought another notebook and started rewriting the entire story.
Two more years later, I ended up with complete draft number three. This time it was just bad. So I put it aside, bought another notebook and started rewriting the entire story.
One year later, in the fall of 2005, I finally had what I believed was an excellent story. So before I printed out the entire manuscript, I started shopping for an agent…and found one who wanted to read the first 50 pages. I printed them out and kept a copy for myself.
Then two things happened that made me not want to have this agent or any other agent represent me. One was that I just didn’t want to go about getting my book published in the normal way with a regular publisher. You see, I’m not just a writer, I’m an entrepreneur; I wanted to start my own publishing company so I could publish my own books whenever I wanted.
The second reason I couldn’t let this agent represent me was because the story was all wrong. I realized that the book that I just spent six and a half years writing was actually the LAST book in the Dream Doers series.
I wanted to start at the beginning of the series, so I put all that work aside, bought another notebook and some index cards and started writing the story from scratch.
After three and a half years of writing, editing and rewriting, I finally finished a complete draft.
I was teaching high school English at the time, so my students edited the book for me and gave me their feedback. I’ve got to admit that watching them read my story and comment on it made me quite nervous. Much to my relief, though, they liked it and had lots of good things to say about it.
They also had some constructive criticism for me, which I appreciated. I made some big changes to the story based on their feedback, then did what I’ve been dreaming of doing my entire life: I published my book.
In next week’s episode, I’ll share what happened after I published it and why seeing it on the Amazon bestseller list freaked me out so much that I stopped promoting it altogether!
Please don’t wait as long as I did to start living your dreams! Life is really much more fun when you set goals and take action to make them happen. No matter how old you are, you can be an unshakable, unbreakable, unstoppable Dream Doer today!
To help, I want to give you three FREE gifts, which includes the entire audio book of The Dream Doers and the Summer of Secrets. All three gifts are waiting for you at the www.TheDreamDoers.com. Click through and claim them now!
To Your Dreams,
Bonnie Jean
