The first time I visited HarperCollins

A little #FlashbackFriday for you in the spirit of my practice’s 5th year anniversary—so much happened in 2019:

I can FINALLY can share this!! I’ve literally been holding on to these photos for 5 years. This was me in 2019…sitting in the airport, still very much in my role at AT&T and on my second trip to visit with editors at HarperCollins pitching to Amistad what would eventually become my first title.

I snapped a selfie and said: “This is my author era.”

(There would be three trips.)

I got so close!

But I left there knowing the process and with the tools to pitch and publish books…and I did: three times and edited my daughter’s children’s book as well.

Today, I have a different acquiring editor, but they are publishing my fourth title with hashtag#JVLMedia, so Viola is the cherry on top!

I was reminded last night that these photos were literally burning a hole on my hard drive for the past five years when I scrolled past something in my newsfeed about the iconic Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird.

I am still digesting the fact that HC published that book along with the other legendary books I saw on their shelves. I’m still gobsmacked and thankful that God showed me the path I’d walk years before when I was blessed to visit these halls in person during the well-chronicled sheer hell I faced at my job during that time.

This is only one of the reasons I could go to work smiling and walking tall despite what was being thrown at me.

This is my story, and there is more to it that I will share over time, but trust— favor is real.

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Coach L.