The Write Path #49 - Christian Children's Author, Jennifer Bosma!!!

Jennifer Bosma is enthusiastic about life and embraces the joy in each day. She has been married for 36 years and has three grown daughters and granddaughters. She loves sharing Jesus with women and children across the world through her three Children's Books, and her Front Parking Spot Podcast, which is ranked in the top 100 of Christian podcasts for Moms and families.

 Jennifer serves in women’s ministry and is a consultant at her local pregnancy center. She has authored three award-winning Christian children’s books: God is Three in One, I Know the Plans, and The Baby Garden, and she hosts weekly podcasts. Her Front Parking Spot Podcast reaches women worldwide, mentoring them in Christian principles and encouragement. She retired as an Elementary Education teacher after 23 years and has been known as “Mrs. Bosma” to over 500 students. Engaging author visits with her books bring her back into the classroom and are a great way to keep children passionate about writing, scripture, and Jesus’ plans for them!  

Her Website:  https://jenniferbosma.com/

Her podcast and books:  https://frontparkingspot.com/

Welcome to the Write Path Podcast, where being an author, an actual author, still matters. This isn't the place for the Chat GPT experts or the AI buffs to churn out soulless content with no heart.  This is the place where authors share their journeys, explore their creativity, examine the "Why?" behind it all and come together to celebrate each other. This is the podcast for authors, about authors, and by an author, where the truth still counts and words still have power. Join Us!  You have a story to tell!

Contact us on all our social media platforms and email us at thewritepathpodcast@gmail.com  

This is the place where authors know that every page... is a step forward. Let's move forward together, let's move forward today. Listen now.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:02

Hello everyone and welcome back to the Right Path Podcast, where being an author, an actual author, still matters. Folks, this is the place that uh is for authors. It's about authors, it's by an author. Uh, we are here to share our journeys, to explore our creativity, but most importantly on this podcast, folks, we're here to examine the why behind it all. All right, that's what we do. It's not just about the books, it's about the entire story. Uh, we have an incredible guest with us today. I have had the great blessing of getting to know this lady. Uh, and this is my third interview with her, and we're gonna talk about all new stuff. So, you guys are in for a real treat. Uh, she is an author and a podcaster. Her podcast, front parking spot, it's absolutely fantastic. You want to go check that out? And her books. Uh, The Baby Garden. I Know the Plans. God is three and one. And I know the plans just came out in a board book format. So, folks, uh, you just got here just in time. Uh so anyway, please uh welcome to the show, Jennifer Bosma. Jennifer, how are you doing today?

SPEAKER_01 1:02

I am so good. Thank you so much for having me. We have so much fun on these podcasts together. Thank you for bringing me back.

SPEAKER_00 1:09

Oh, hey, you're an absolute delight. I wish that I had more podcasts to interview on, and then we could just keep on going. But uh the you are you've done so much, okay? You got the podcast, you got the three books, so it just came out in board book. Um, you have a lot of stories to go with this. Why don't you start though? Just tell everybody a little bit about who is Jennifer Bosma, what led you to this entire magnificent, you know, thing you have going on now with all of these activities.

SPEAKER_01 1:33

You know, and I think when people want to be authors, it starts way back, you know. Um, I well, I'm a former teacher for 23 years, and um, you know, then I got called into you know the writing, and that's always been there. I like to say my writing journey started in fourth grade, and when I was reading um Tales of Fourth Grade Nothing with Judy Bloom. I mean, Judy Bloom is such a great author, and I remember I didn't really like reading books until that one. And I read the book, I don't know, and I there was two when when the book, the book setting is in New York City in a condominium. I was a little girl living in Florida, completely different worlds. So I read that book, really got into it, and then after I was done, I wrote 17 pages on notebook paper, Patty the Pain. So I just kind of like copied that and wrote a book on my own, and that was my first book in night in fourth grade. So fast forward teaching elementary school, and I was always a writing teacher with all the um teachers and just always wanted to encourage kids to write. So that's kind of how my writing journey began. I always, and I, you know, I always love going into the scholastic book fairs. If you have some authors out there and potential future authors, they would have to agree that going into like a library or a Barnes and Noble or when you're in the school setting, the Scholastic Book Fair always just gets you so excited. So that's how I knew that the writing call didn't stop. And um, I knew I had to do that, and I knew that was one of the things in my life that I really wanted to do was to become a published author. So that's a little bit of the story of where I came from.

SPEAKER_00 3:11

Nice, nice. You always wanted to be this published author. That's fantastic. Then what got you to start putting these things down? Was there a moment or an event? You know, always wanting it is one thing. Actually doing it, that's a whole different kind of story. So, what was the prompt to get Jennifer to go? Time to put some of this on paper and enact this dream.

SPEAKER_01 3:31

And that's exactly it, Rory, is putting it on paper. You know, back in the day we had notebooks, you know, and I had big binders and I would just write things. And that's what I like to tell future authors is get writing. You don't have to have the computer. If you want to just get like a binder of a notebook, even the old spiral ones, just get your ideas down. Everything you write down doesn't mean that that's going to be your next book. Sometimes you just have to get you get an idea and you start writing notes and you start keeping, and some of them will take off, others of them won't. Everything you write doesn't need like that's not your future book, not all of them. So I would really encourage people to actually write things down in a book because the problem you can also do it on the computer too, but I find when I get on the computer and I start typing things in word, I get all kinds of underlying red letters, you know, like, oh, this is misspelled and this is a run-on sentence. And then you spend your time editing that. And I know it kind of goes hand in hand, you know, if you have ideas, you know, and then you have the editing. You don't want to have your creative flow hindered by word with the underlying letters or the misspellings, and then you just you get nowhere. You're just focusing on that paragraph. That comes later. Right now, with my fourth book, what I'm working on is just that. I'm actually writing it down on a notebook piece of paper. All my ideas, I get up and I like to tell this to authors too, and I tell this to myself. If you have, everyone has an idea for a book. If you have an idea that is not leaving you, I I'm a Christian publisher, I mean Christian author, so I like to say I pray about it. I really pray what God has me writing. I I sit down, sometimes I know what I'm writing right now, but I sometimes I just it's the obedience to actually sit down and have that time set aside that you're just gonna write. My my time is in the morning. I wake up at 6 a.m. I get out here and I sit down, and sometimes I don't know what I'm gonna write that day, but I pray. My obedience is there, and I just sit down and then just God gives me a download and then I just write. Now there's gonna be a time when I feel like my downloading of that book is done, and I can step back and look at it, start to edit, start to get in on Word, start to make the corrections. That's great. But I like to tell authors you just have to really be disciplined to save that time to sit down and actually do it because so many people are like, I've got this best idea in my head, and they talk to me about it, but they haven't even written the first word.

SPEAKER_00 6:04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 6:05

So you gotta get to the writing part and slate some time for yourself to do that.

SPEAKER_00 6:10

I love it. And of course, I was gonna ask you about the process, but you went right there. I mean, you can tell you're a podcaster. You're just gonna you're segueing for me. I mean, really, I'm folks, I'm just gonna sit back with coffee and Jennifer's gonna handle the rest of this interview because we're we're good to go.

SPEAKER_01 6:23

Well, you know, it's it's the advice I get because I have so many people, and when you're an author, you get everyone and their brother that comes to you. Oh my gosh, you're an author. Tell me how you did it. And I've had so I've had countless countless lunches with people, and I give them the same advice that I'm have to take myself, you know. So I just love sharing that and to just just if you want to be a book writer, you just have to write.

SPEAKER_00 6:49

Yeah, for sure. It's almost like uh you have to work the muscle, you know, to get it to to operate. So even if the muscle is your brain and your creativity. So your your faith is obviously very important to you. I know this because I've known you a long time. You mentioned it a couple of times already in the podcast. Um, what does that do for you? What do you draw from that in terms of your process, your writing, your motivation, everything?

SPEAKER_01 7:12

Everything. I um when God gives me an idea, sometimes I'm like, okay, for instance, in 1994 I wrote my first book, The Baby Garden. I'm gonna take you back there really quickly. I had this story about where babies come from based on Jeremiah 1.5. And I would tell all my kids and where babies come from, they come from the baby garden. And is based by before I formed you in the womb, I knew you. So I would tell all my kids that. So, you know, I wrote that story, I sent it off to 75 people snail mail back in the day in '94. You didn't have computers, you would actually mail a manuscript in a self-addressed stamped envelope. And then, you know, it got, it didn't get picked up by publishers, but it got tabled for 26 years. But when you're a writer, when I said everything, God does not leave those ideas that He wants you to take to the next to publish. Every year I kept thinking, I need to try again with the baby garden. And I would have a lot of little stories written in this. I still have this book. It's a big binder of all my ideas. But that story never left me. So I like to say to people that when God gives you an idea, you really pray about it. And if it does not leave you, that is one that He wants you to pursue. So my faith is everything to me. I mean, I really just kind of before I start writing, sometimes when I know like my next book, what it is, I just have to really ask, okay, Lord, what do you want me to write today? And I have to be obedient, take this pen and I start writing. And and it's crazy the direction sometimes it goes. What I sit down to do is not what I had thought I would be doing. So I think just really seeking the Lord, asking for his help, asking for his clarity, and that is how I focus my faith to get into my writing.

SPEAKER_00 8:57

Nice, and that's where all three of these books have come from, really. The uh, but you had a specific purpose. So you had the you got the idea, you got the inspiration, everything else, uh, you know, through faith. God guides you, but there's a purpose to these books too. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 9:13

Yes. Well, the first book, and I have one here, I don't know if I'm with my blurred background, the baby, let's see, the baby garden. And what I love about the baby garden, um that kind of got me into volunteering at pregnancy centers. And I did not know it at the time, but this book, The Baby Garden, is in over 300 pregnancy centers across the country. And I didn't realize that was that's why I was writing it. But that is when women go, it's in um, it's in the waiting rooms. And when women go in, if they pick that up or they're given a gift book, they can know that God has a plan for their baby even if they don't. And that turned into my ministry. That this is what got the whole thing started. So that's how that one worked out. Um, do you want me to go through all three real quick?

SPEAKER_00 9:58

Yeah, that'd be great. Go ahead.

SPEAKER_01 10:00

Okay, and then the next one. So I wrote this one, everything was great. And a lot of people say that your first book is not your like your the holy grail. The first book is not like where you hit it. The first book, you get into it, you learn the process, you learn a ton. Um, you learn a ton with your first book that you need a website. And so many people don't want to do a website, they just want to write their books. Like, I'm not a website person. And back in the day when I first did that book, um, I was told by Sarah Ballantine, she is the paleo mom. She's a New York Times best-selling book, you know, author. I was teaching her daughter at the time, and she's like, You need a blog. I'm like, I don't want a blog. And she goes, You need a blog and you need a website. I'm like, I I just have children's books ideas. I don't really need a website. Yes, you do. So that's one of the things I tell authors too, is you need a website. Because if you get all this writing out and all the books, and I can talk about the book number two and three in a minute, but the people need a place to go. You need a platform. If you don't have a a blog uh website, and you know, kind of blogs, that's why I got into podcasting because people don't read blogs anymore. So I got into podcasting from my blogs, but still it's a landing page. It's people it's a place where people can learn about me, it's a place where people can go to order my books, and I do put I do make it fresh every week. I add things to it every week. However, you all have to get a website. You go and you think of a domain, and you know this, you know this about getting a domain. You have to pick a lot of times, like I'm really glad I didn't choose like the babygarden.com, even though that is one of my domains that will flood into jenniferbosma.com, you need to get kind of a general um website that you can give everybody that will take all your stuff, like all your podcasts that you do and any of the books that you support, you have to have one kind of common spot. So jenniferbosma.com is my website, but all the other, like I know the planskidbooks.com and goddess3andone.com, that will all feed into that as domains. So domains are cheap. If whoever your listeners, if they're thinking, all right, I need to get a website, what could it be? The bestwriter.com. Okay, go your go to your hovers, go to your Squarespace, go to your go daddies, wherever you buy a domain, just buy a domain. They're like $18 a year. Get your domain and just start with one. Um, my mother-in-law has gospelgranny.com and that was available, and she has gospel granny like you for 18 bucks a year. And that's how people, you just really need to get a you need to get a um a platform, and that would be a website. So for your listeners out there, if you don't have an idea for your website yet, you need to do that. And that's what I tell all kinds of authors that that want to get started, have some ideas, you just need a landing platform for when your books do come out. Nice. So I really kind of segmented into that.

SPEAKER_00 13:02

Well, I knew that I knew if I awakened the educator in you that this was gonna just take care of itself. I just absolutely knew this. Oh, yeah. Here we are.

SPEAKER_01 13:11

I mean, I'm like having lunch with you, Rory. This is what we would do. If you are like saying, Hey, how do I get a book? I'm gonna tell you this is how you get started with it.

SPEAKER_00 13:19

Well, I yeah, all of our listeners appreciate this. We have a ton of listeners who message me who are um aspiring authors, they want to become authors. So that's a big thing to give to these folks on this show. I appreciate what you're doing. Yeah. The uh you do have two more books though.

SPEAKER_01 13:35

Yes, and my second book. Okay, so for all the authors out there, when you that's this is why when you get an idea, like I you you kind of when I took the baby garden and it came out to be published in 2018 after 26 years, I submitted it. I've learned a lot about publishers, and we'll talk about that in a minute. This one got picked up in a week, and I was just so happy. And I just remember crying and just being like, my idea of finally being a published author has come to fruition. I'm so thrilled, all the things. And then that one came out, and we can talk about that process in a minute. But my second book came. A lot of people are like, where do you get your inspiration? You can't force a book, okay? I have a lot of books that I've written that I thought would be my next ones, but I'm like, I'm not sure. But it was when I was holding my granddaughter, she was newly born. I'm a new grandma, I'm holding her. And I know the plans came at that moment because being an educator, and this is for all y'all out there, you read to a child every day of their life, even if they're sleeping, even if they're a newborn, you are reading them a book. Because we can go into that about the vocabulary of books and reading and all that will increase a child's um vocabulary. I mean, it just it exponentially when they're in one year old, like what they've been exposed to. So even if they're sleeping, you read to them. I was doing that. So I'm like, I'm having a moment. I'm gonna read to my my granddaughter for the first book. What do I read? I'm looking around. I see Goodnight Moon from you know, the baby shower, bring a book instead of a card. We got the hop and pop. So we got the, you know, all the um good night moon, all the books. And I'm like, I need to read a Bible. I want her first thing that she hears is the word. So I end up grabbing a kid's Bible that she got from um one of our baby showers. And then it was then that I realized I had to write, I know the plans. All the scriptures that I prayed over my daughters just randomly would say in prayers and say over their bed before they would go to bed at night. I wanted to put all those scriptures in a book, and that's what I did. And it came to me when I was holding her. So if you are an uh you know, a person who wants to be an author, you get those moments. Don't let them go away. Like, wait, you know, it's wait. I remember where I was. I was sitting in her, the the family room with laundry pits stacks everywhere, and she's unloading her hospital bag. There was nothing glamorous about it, but I'm sitting there and in my own mind, in my own place, I got this idea for I know the plans. And I'm like, wait a minute. And I didn't let it go away. So that's when I went to my notebook, wrote it down, and really started praying about it. Like, okay, Lord, is this from you? And then it was, and then it just came, and then the whole book came in, um, whole book came in rhyme. And this is I know the plans, just newly in um board book. Um, it's also in hardback too, and that's and this was all in rhyme, and it's with Beth Snyder, who is my illustrator, who's incredible, and it's it and the scripture goes with the text, and it's like a God talking to the baby about their whole life. It is the best book for baby showers, but I wanted to encourage your authors out there when you get the idea, you know, write it down, go with it, don't forget it, and really kind of examine like, wait, is this my next book? And when it is, it is like you can tell, like all the other books that I had written, kind of thinking this is gonna be my book too. Mm-mm, nope. It was this one, and it was clear and it comes, and then you just and then it doesn't leave you. So that's how you know when it happens, and you never know. It could be, like I said, a crazy environment with laundry stacked next to you, and you just had this moment that you gotta listen to those moments.

SPEAKER_00 17:07

Yeah, you gotta be on on guard for those to happen. You know, be noticing and be purposeful and a whole bit.

SPEAKER_01 17:13

So and the third book was the same way with that too. Go ahead.

SPEAKER_00 17:16

I was just gonna ask you.

SPEAKER_01 17:17

Oh, well, the third book, Goddess Three and One, and I I think you already know this story. Um, walking with that same grandchild who was now four, in their front yard in Texas, said something about the Holy Spirit, and this one I was trying to think, what's gonna be my third book? Like, I really want there's more in me. There's more coming. I know you get the you get the bite, you get the bug. And she's like, Grandma, I said something about the Holy Spirit. And she goes, Grandma, who's the Holy Spirit? And I said, I said, sweet girl. I said, You know that chicken coop in your backyard? You know how you've got the chicken eggs and you got the you when you grab an egg, you got the egg shell, then you break it open, you got the egg white, and you got the egg yolk, three parts of the egg. But that's like God is three and one, you got the whole God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit, just like the chicken egg. And she's like, Grandma, the Holy Spirit's a chicken egg. I'm like, no, no, no, no, no. And that is where that idea came from, on a dusty driveway, not paved, in front of the house with her. And I'm like, wait a minute, is there anything out there on the Trinity? Okay, just so you know, no author sets out saying, Hey, I want to write a book on the Trinity. Yeah, it's not like your go-to topic.

SPEAKER_00 18:29

Right.

SPEAKER_01 18:29

But when that one came out, and the idea, I just sat and it came out and everything came in rhyme, and the to see God's hand with that, how that all came to fruition. That book came out really, really quick. Hundreds and hundreds of edits on that. And when I gave it, and the hardest part, y'all, with the authors out there, the hardest part is to give your writing to somebody to read it, you know, because you're kind of making yourself very vulnerable. Like, here I am. You gotta do that though, let them read it. And sometimes the you they may they may not understand, they may not be in your mind of of what's behind it. And um, they may be like, hmm, wait, what are you doing here? Like, oh, and you may not get the response that you want from them, but don't let that discourage you. You know, when I my my third book, when I um gave it to one person, like, wait, what are you doing here? I I don't really get the rhyme. I'm like, I know I'm still editing, but then I shared it with my daughter, and she was like, Mom, this has a lot of potential, and you can help other moms learn and parents learn about the Trinity too. Keep going. And sometimes just don't be discouraged when you give your vision to somebody and they don't see it right away. Don't let that discourage you, future authors out there. Just stick with it. That just means you need to refine it more, you need to edit it more. And Goddess Three and One was edited hundreds of times, and it's all in rhyme explaining the Trinity to children. So that's another encouragement for your future authors out there.

SPEAKER_00 20:00

There you go. The process of uh going through and doing all these books, uh, obviously it's a little different from book to book to book. And uh, I've had the opportunity for you and I to have a couple different conversations, and uh they've been every every single one's a blessing. Uh, and I learned things from you a lot. We were recently having a conversation about um publishers, you know, and how things have been a little bit different. Um, you had some some different experiences, uh, maybe from book to book to book, from publisher to publisher. Um I'm curious if you want to maybe share some of that with the folks because everybody's trying to figure out how do I get published, which way do I go, what do I do? And I think you've got quite a bit to maybe enlighten them about.

SPEAKER_01 20:41

Yeah, I really do. I've learned a ton. And you know, you get the whole agent thing. Oh, I need to find an agent. Okay. Um no, you don't. Okay. What I've learned from this, here's some couple um nuggets. Everyone wants to get picked up traditionally published. Now, the problem with a new author is traditional publishing houses like your penguin, your Penguin Random House, Simon Schuster, McMillan, um, Harper Collins, those are the big five. And there's um Hatchet book group, those are your big five. They are not going to go to a general person who just has this desire to learn to write books. You have to kind of, they don't take any unsolicited manuscripts. That means that you're not allowed to send them your copy. Okay. So I've learned with traditional publishing houses, it's very hard to crack that. A lot of people think that they need to get an agent. Now, when you're an author, you don't, it's gone are the days of making the like the big, big bucks, unless you're a famous person already. Now, this is if you're a famous person and you have a platform that you can put your books out there and you're gonna have a thousand people come by them. That's I'm not talking to you. I'm talking to like just a regular person who has this desire to write a book. It takes it's slow and steady. No one is going to get rich quickly from writing a book. It is a lot of work and a lot of time commitment, but usually author. Who want to write a book, they're willing to do that. They're willing to put the time in. One thing I've learned from traditional publishers, there's four types. You've got your traditional publisher, you've got your hybrid publishing, you've got your self-publishing, and you've got your vanity. It's just four. Now, where are you going to fit in that four? So your traditional publishers basically buy your book from you. And it's really hard to get the look of the big ones without like an agent. And then if you get an agent, then you have to pay them pennies on the dollar for your book. You basically give your whole book away. You have no say on the illustrations, you have no say on the edits, you have no say on any of it. You basically sell them your book and then they will eventually pay you royalties. Your royalties come way after the book expense is done. I don't even know how people, unless you're a big wig, like a big name, would really, you know, cash in on that. And I'm talking children's books. This is my experiences with children's books. Okay, so the other thing with traditional publishing is you still have to market it. They will market it lightly, but you still have to do the work. I know I have a lot of friends that are with traditional publishers that they are still doing all the things that I'm doing to promote their book. The public, the long now that we're so much on Zoom and like so much on virtual events, even the book fairs and the book shows are not as many. Basically, it's all digital and digital sales and stuff. So if you are with a traditional publisher, when I was my third book is with um Fusion, which is a imprint of Endgame Press, who is a traditional publisher. I was in the same training when they were training their authors and how to promote your book as the people who were traditionally published. That is one thing I did not know. I thought if you're traditionally published, it just comes and you just everything, you're just booked just goes into every target and to every um everywhere. And it's not that way. All books can get on Amazon. There's like something north of four million books. All books can get on Amazon, and that's pretty easy to do. Actually, getting an ISBN number that's the self-publishing route, um, is not very hard to do. However, you still have to promote that. So let me go back. So we've got traditional publishing, that's when they buy you completely out. You get pennies on the dollar, hardly any money comes through you. Um, publisher has all the creative control. Um, hybrid publishing is a blend of traditional and self-publishing. That is what I did for my third book with Goddess Three and One. The reason why I did it with that is because I wanted to have a say on my illustrations and I wanted to have a say on the rhyme. And and so, and I had to hybrid publishing, I had to pay in. I had to pay some money, and then I get a higher percentage of my royalties. So traditional publishing, you hardly get any, but with this, I get a little bit of a higher percentage of the books that they sell, and I actually can get some decent paychecks from that. Um, so you you buy in. So it takes it a while, it takes some time to get your money back because you've had to invest in your illustrations, and um you there's a paint that you usually you get a contract, you get all that, but you do have some creative control with that. Um now publishers want to get when you're doing children's books, they want to get cheaper illustrators. Illustrators are very expensive. The illustrators from my books, uh, Beth Snyder is incredible, and I knew I was willing to make the investment for her. She is $450 a page for illustration. It was a lot of money. However, her pictures are stunning and it's not, it does not look like it was produced in like um on something called Fiverr. F-I-V-E-R-R is a place where people can go and get creatives. Right. A lot of them are good and they're not near as expensive, but a lot of the publishing looks foreign. These, I mean, I'm sorry, the illustrations look pretty foreign. It looks like they maybe were created in Asia or in an Indian market. They have that, the illustrations aren't beautiful. Like, so I really wanted to have good illustrations, especially in a children's book. So, in a hybrid publishing, you have a say on who they hire. They can hire a cheaper publisher, so you won't pay as much, but I wanted to get Beth Snyder, who's amazing. Okay, the next one is self-publishing, and self-publishing, there's some really great places that do this, and you have to have a book designer, and that even costs money. So when I was debating between the self-publishing on my book three, um, when I did the cost of creating the book and the cost of the art that would all be on me, and then it wasn't that much different than hybrid. Hybrid went a little bit more, but they're gonna help me market my book more. Am I still gonna have to help with marketing? Absolutely. It doesn't matter. Traditional hybrid or self-publishing or vanity, you have to do it all.

SPEAKER_00 27:03

Right.

SPEAKER_01 27:04

But um, so the self-publishing, I didn't, I felt like they, you know, the hybrid will help you, they help store the books, they do help promote the books, they do a little bit more. So I never have done the total self-publishing route. However, a lot of people get pretty great success doing um doing the self-publishing and doing the um through Amazon and Amazon KDP, Ingram Spark, and some digital ones. Then there's vanity publishing, and I kind of feel like my first two books, the baby garden, and I know the plans were vanity. And vanity is you pay a certain amount, you have to order, like I had to order 300 books at full price, so that's an initial payment they get right away. They want to get the cheaper illustrators, so you pay full price for 300 books, so it comes out to like 600 six thousand dollars, and then and then they like get the ISBN number, they get it, everyone can get it on Amazon and Barnes and Noble. That's in Christian book, they can they can get it on that. It's pretty easy. So they did all the work on that, but I it's a I don't get much money for my royalties at all. They own the rights. Um, so the vanity publishing, they kind of just get it, they produce it, and then it's done. Then they don't really market it anymore. You may get marketing for like three months, and then you're just kind of a book on their shelf. And unless you're very squeaky with like I am with I know the plans. So I know the plans is more coming from that, but I really they don't, oh, and they're terrible. Another thing about publishing houses is they don't give you the price breakdown on your book. It's very hard to get your royalty money at all. Like when so if you're looking to get there's some books, there's some book, um, there's some publishing houses that have different imprints that are kind of more like self-publishing, that they work with you or like basically hybrid, but you have to ask how they give you your royalty report. They're supposed to give you your royalty report every six months. Actually, both publishers have been very bad at that. Very bad. You basically have to beg and steal and cry and do everything. Hey, can I have my report? Oh, it's coming, and you get lots of excuses. So if you're looking for any kind of publisher, ask them, do you guarantee that I will get a publishing re royalty report every six months? Because the ones I have, ambassadors are pretty tough about giving that, giving any reports.

unknown 29:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 29:26

Appreciate you sharing all that. I mean, that was like a fire hose of information. It was fantastic. So I I love it. The but that is something that I hear a lot about uh from folks who are working on their books or who have one out there. They always kind of feel like uh they want to have a friend order one or something so they can try and check the royalty report because they're like, how do I really know that this actually is the number? You know, in all honesty, the only answer you can give them is you don't.

SPEAKER_01 29:53

And there's you can go to Amazon Author, you can get own your own account, Amazon Author, and they you can look and see what how many of your books are selling. And then when you get a report from your publisher, they're like, um, well, we don't, that's not really an accurate report. I'm like, what do you mean? Like it says I've sold 300 books in one month, and you're giving me a royal, you know, that doesn't not nothing matches, and you have no way to check it. So um I would watch the Vanity Publishers because that's what they do. So I think your hybrid is a little bit better, and it's just questions that you're the future authors need to ask.

SPEAKER_00 30:27

The um yeah, when it comes to the Amazon uh thing, uh they still have it's been a little while since I self-published, but they have uh a thing still where you retain the right to sell it yourself, right?

SPEAKER_01 30:40

I believe so. I've never done the KDP with the um the self-publishing. I know there's a way and people do really well with it. And sometimes they can get like a, you know, they can go viral and get a number one bestseller. And it it is like every day, the more you invest time in it, you learn more and more things. But what I have learned is you're not gonna get rich quick on it. Right. So the people that think, oh, I'm gonna sell, I'm gonna become a I'm gonna be in the airports. I always kind of look at the airport bookstores as like, okay, that's the end all. I mean, even with three books published, I'm like, I wish my books could be in uh the airport bookstore, but um, they're not. And you wonder how they pick them. And some of them are so bad, you're like, oh my gosh, mine is I like mine better. But yes, but it's a slow process and it's you have to, and when you're writing a book, try to think of a book that will stand the test of time. You know, and like I remember my publisher, the Vanity one, vanished Vanity Publisher said, if I see another book written about COVID, oh my gosh, because in five years, no one's gonna want to read a book about COVID. You have to make sure your your topic is timeless.

SPEAKER_00 31:47

There we go. All right, like yours are for sure. Yeah, absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 31:50

I like to think they are.

SPEAKER_00 31:51

Yeah, for sure. Now, you mentioned earlier you were very adamant about have the website. And that's something that people want to have. Now, if someone buys a book, for in your example anyway, someone buys a book on your website, does it then get ordered from the publisher and get put back out? Or is it coming from some other way? How's the publisher involved in your order from your website?

SPEAKER_01 32:12

They're not at all. That's just directly from me. In my situation, I have my own supply. So I have like a little store at my house. So if they order books from me, I sign them and then I can make them personalize. And then I sell them for the price on the back of the book or a little bit more. I know with my board book, um, the price in the back is $16.99, but shipping was twelve hundred dollars. So I have to charge a little bit more for that just to cover my cost. Um, because usually with a publisher, when you buy your books back, you can usually buy them at 50%. So you're making about, um, like say if a book is 20, you're making, you're buying it for about 10. So you have $10 for um flexibility, you know, for profit. However, your profit comes in with your supplies of your shipping. Um, usually you have people pay your shipping, but um it you're the publisher will charge you shipping. So when I get all my books at home from my store, I have to pay shipping, and that's a lot of money. So it really kind of, and then if you sell, if my $20 book, if I sell it to a store locally, she's gotta make profit as well. So we pretty much split it. Like I make five and she makes five. So I usually sell my books, like if you have it for $20, you would sell your books, you know, for $10 or like $12. So you can both make a little bit of money, or you we want to make it a little bit more, so maybe like $13, and then you each kind of get a you can do the math. However, back to your question, I have a supply of books at my house. I sign them. That's kind of like my unique thing, better than Amazon. And the because Amazon, they're not signed from me. I can sign them and I have an inscription thing that I can write like to Susie, you know, may you, you know, you you be blessed with your new baby or whatever. Um, I can write them and I usually put a little note in there and it's just make it more personalized. So um that's how I do it. But your books from your website are just from you. However, you can have a spot if you don't want to ship on my website on jenniferbosmo.com, you can go can buy on Amazon or Barnes and Noble, click here. You can have a spot that takes them right to Amazon on your website. So if you don't want to have any kind of supply, you can do that. And then they can get to your website, click on Amazon, and go there and buy it that way. But they're not going to be signed.

SPEAKER_00 34:28

Makes sense. I appreciate the look behind the curtain.

SPEAKER_01 34:30

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 34:31

So that's um all right. So then with the baby garden, yeah, you were talking about how those are in um parenting centers and places like that. So is that that's something that you handle directly in terms of you warehouse the stock, you replenish them when they run out.

SPEAKER_01 34:46

Yep. And with the baby garden, that's kind of my ministry. What I would do, I I had all the states, I had the 50 states written on a piece of paper, and I would go to Alaska and I would look for pregnancy centers in Alaska. And then I would actually go to their contact page and say, Hey, would you? This is my book. I'd give my pitch. Would you like my book for your waiting room or to bless a mama that has an unplanned pregnancy? And then it's it's like that's your cold calling. And then they say, Oh, yes, I love one. And I would send them a free book. And I would just say, Hey, please give me a review. That's another thing. People don't really give you reviews, they mean to do it, but then they don't. And so, out of probably out of a hundred reviews that you ask people to do, you may get maybe 15 out of 100 people. Wow, it's a very low percentage, but people don't realize, especially when you have a new book that comes out, if you have a new book come out, you need to have about 50 reviews in the first six weeks. So that's when you're shamelessly asking for reviews. And sometimes I would give books out for free and say, here, I'm gonna give you this book and trade for a review just to kind of get it populated and have the analytics on Amazon populate it so it kind of comes up in people's searches. So those are all the fun things you get to learn.

SPEAKER_00 36:02

Interesting. The the review process, uh, especially on Amazon, has gone through quite a bit of stuff, you know, a lot of transformation over the last 15, uh, even 20 years. The um there were people who were paying for reviews, there are people who are saying, hey, you know, um do five reviews on five books, and you know, I'll give you five bucks and this and that. Um so I know Amazon kind of cracked down on some of that and they started looking more like a verified purchase type thing. So has that kind of cleared up that you can tell? I mean, being in the industry on a full-time basis, the way you do, or is that still one of those things where the review you know helps, but it's not as important as it used to be?

SPEAKER_01 36:43

I think the reviews still really help because I notice when my reviews stop coming and I stopped pushing for them, my numbers on my Amazon author where I can search my titles drop. And I think if that's current and fluid, and I like to tell people that you can review on Amazon. You're not a verified purchase, of course, unless you buy it on Amazon, you get the product, and you can review here. That's great. So if you ever find people that say, Oh, I didn't buy them from you, I bought them from Amazon, I'm like, Yay, go in there, would you please review for me? And they're like, Oh yeah, you know, half of them, maybe like maybe a quarter of them do, but most of them don't. They mean well, but they're busy. Um, but that's so that's good for that. But if you can also review on Amazon, even if you don't buy the book, like so. When I send a friend, like if I sold, if I sent you a book for a grandchild and you got it, you could go to your Amazon account, find my book, search it, and and do a review, even though you didn't buy it from there. But where it gets sketchy is when there's like a hundred on that same day of people that didn't write, you know, if the numbers start looking skewed, right? That's when there's a red flag and Amazon may pull it. Um, if there's just one here or there, I so I always tell people, if you bought it for me, here's my barcode, I give them a barcode, go to my website that will take you to Amazon and you can review it for me. So as long as you have an Amazon account, you can give a review, just not a hundred in a day. And you would never get that. People are like, oh, don't write it out. And then they don't.

SPEAKER_00 38:08

Right. A hundred in a day. Yeah. I mean, hey, if you're selling them any books, that's great.

SPEAKER_01 38:11

Yeah, that's that would be a red flag, but verified purchase, you can have that hundred in a day. If it's actually bought from there, then that's legit. So but they will they will allow them.

SPEAKER_00 38:21

Sure. Now, for people who are out there and they want they're aspiring authors, um, and maybe they probably don't have a podcast either yet. Okay. How how does the podcast work in tandem with the the books for you?

SPEAKER_01 38:33

You know, I love it because um at first I started just being a guest because being in the um with my on my books, I have a ministry to moms and the power of scripture and really encouraging moms, you know. So that's what I do through the Front Parking Spot podcast. But what's been great about this is when I'm a guest, I can kind of tell the stories behind my books because when I'm being a host, I'm not really talking about myself because that wouldn't be very fair for a guest. Um, but but when I get to be a guest and I get to share the stories and why I wrote them and all that, that's that's been really great. And I love the podcasting component of it because people are way easier, they're gonna be way more likely to listen to a podcast than sit down and read a blog. The blogs, you know, unless it's really quick and even with emails, I know we get so many of them, and I'm on a lot of mailing lists and stuff, and sometimes I'll just skim them, you know. But when they're the really long ones, A, it took that person a really long time to write that. That's why I try to make my emails real short, kind of talk about the podcasts that are coming up and things going on with my books. But so that's how I work with that.

SPEAKER_00 39:38

Nice. Now, are your uh all your books available as ebooks and or audiobooks as well?

SPEAKER_01 39:44

You know, I do believe they are. They are kids' books, so I really encourage people to actually get the book. There are like the ebook, I think it's $5.99, so it's much cheaper through Amazon. But what I love, there's nothing like actually, I'm a big proponent of limited electronics for children. So when you actually have that book and you're turning the pages and seeing the text and not looking at a screen, I'm a big, like hard copy book girl versus the electronic.

SPEAKER_00 40:14

Nice. No, the board book coming out for I know the plans, that was a very big thing for you recently. Yes, yes, about that and and and why, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 40:22

Yeah, you know, and this was the ambassador um international. I mean, because this book just screams little kids, and they love turning the pages and they love because we go around the world, you know, we're in Africa. You can't really see, I know it's blurry because of my blurred background. Um, we're in Africa, then we're in um, you know, the desert, and you know, we're just going around and you want kids, and I had so many parents that would say to me, Oh my goodness, this book has to be in a board book because my kids love this book and they're sitting in their car seat looking at it. And when they have a hard back book with paper pages, they're just gonna get ripped. But um, the I know the plans for the board book because it is for littles, it is a great book for, I mean, for anybody. You can it could be like, oh, the places you go with Dr. Seuss. I mean, I've heard people giving it for graduation gifts. Like you, it's timeless. Like, God has big plans for you when you're a kid or when you're an adult. Um, so I really think the board book, and it is the first book that they have done, board book for my publisher. It was a very, but however, it comes out, so you can only buy that book from me. I don't know if they've able they were able, because this is remember, they're kind of more of a vanity publisher, and I don't really, I don't know how they're promoting it. I think they were just, I said, hey, I need to get this in a board book, and I did the investment. And so pretty much these books are just in my house that I can sign and send off. Um, I'm hoping they can get them on Amazon. And I've heard that they did get some for their for the publishing house that they'll mail them off to people, but I'm gonna be like like we've talked about before, I'm gonna be the one marketing. So this book is just gonna be a board book that I'm gonna send to people from my home or book signings and author visits.

SPEAKER_00 42:08

How do people order one from you then? Just go online and then you can see it.

SPEAKER_01 42:12

Yeah, jenniferbosma.com is where you'd find it. And like when we talked about those websites, you just get one website at first, but then you can you can buy other websites that will funnel into your jenniferbosma.com or whatever your main book is. So if you wrote a book like The Great Bison and your name is whoever, you can have thegreatbison.com if no one has picked that and have it connected to your account. So if someone Google search thegreatbison.com, it's gonna come to your author page. So um, your main author page is mygenenniferbosman.com. And then, of course, all this stuff is on Instagram with the front parking, just front parking spot is my Instagram, and then front parking spot is also the podcast. So those are all ways that people can find me.

SPEAKER_00 42:58

Awesome. We'll make sure that stuff's in the show notes, of course, so people can, you know, in fact, find you. Now, I'm curious about the board book. Um, one last question on that topic. Sure. When those run out, is that it? Or are you gonna replenish that supply and keep doing it?

SPEAKER_01 43:12

You know, um, we're gonna see how it goes because they're a little bit, they're much thicker and they're gonna be a little bit more expensive to um ship. So right now I am gonna be charging um, you know, they're $16.99 on the back of the book. I had to pay half of that to my publisher. And then I wasn't counting on the $2,000 shipping fee. So that definitely adds to it. So you have to do the math so you make a little bit of money. So, yes, if they sell really well, you know, like my husband has this great expression if it don't make dollars, it don't make sense. So, um, yeah, so we're gonna we're gonna so I'll definitely keep some for if I don't order more, I'll just definitely keep a supply for my own grandbabies. But right now I have 560 books, so I am able to send them off. And if there's a big demand, if it makes dollars and makes sense, then I will definitely order some more because now we have a path to do it.

SPEAKER_00 44:07

Okay. So if they order from the website, they're getting one from you.

SPEAKER_01 44:11

Yep. Okay. Because there's no the board book you can't get from anybody else except from me. So that's jenniferbosma.com. Now I know the plans, Goddess Three and One and the Baby Garden are all on Amazon. Barnes and Noble, anywhere you would get books, um, they can order them, but Amazon definitely has it. And Goddess and I have all of them. I have Goddess Three and One, I have the Baby Garden, and I know the plans, both both versions.

SPEAKER_00 44:34

You able to sign the board book?

SPEAKER_01 44:36

Yep. Oh yeah. I've really worked it out really well. There's a page, and I I'm a big purple pen girl, and that's a thing for you authors out there. You get a color, you get a shtick. Um, I sign my all my books in a purple pen. When I first started signing them, someone said, You must date them. So I dated them. But then the problem with that is when I sold them to stores, if it was the next year, like if I started dating them like in September, and then they still had my inventory come January, no one wanted that book. It was like a damaged item. So I would not say date them unless they tell you to date them and you're signing it for a person particularly. Do not just date them for someone's supply. And then you can also get the signed by the author stickers, and that makes them special too when you mail them directly to people.

SPEAKER_00 45:21

Love it. I I've never had the chance to kind of get behind the curtain with you on the whole, you know, uh how this works type of thing. So I appreciate everything you've you've shared today. I do have one more question for you, and you've been very generous with your time, and I know you're doing a ton of stuff with your family and your house and your books and everything else. So thank you for that. Um the uh everybody who's who listened to this either is an author or they're an aspiring author or they know an author. Um, what is the best piece of advice that you can give out there to authors, whether aspiring or current, who are just simply not quite where you are yet?

SPEAKER_01 45:54

I would say do it. Just get down and write. And I would also um get all of your writing down because a lot of people they they start thinking about the publishing component before the story is written. When you write a book, like I have a dear, dear friend who has a great idea for a book and she sent it to me, and it was especially with children's books, you have to be cognizant of how long it is for kids, and you have to really think of your audience. So I whatever book you're writing, think about your audience and think about what will draw them in. I'm pretty much just with kids, so I'm thinking of engaging text with great pictures that has a great cadence and isn't too long because I'm the grandma when they uh when your grandkids say, oh grandma, just one more book and you read it. But then when they give you a book that's like a Disney book that's really long and you're like, oh boy, then you start skipping um paragraphs because you're trying to get through it quickly. So I would just really encourage people A to write, B to be humble enough to really edit. No one wants like major details. Get a good, you know, it depends what type of book you're writing. It might not Christian books, but um, you know, you really have to kind of think about the reader and your audience and really not lose them with too many characters and and be open to have people reading it and giving you constructive criticism because that's a hard thing when you share your your love and your life, like your passion to someone. You have to have a thick skin and you want to get feedback because you know that's the best way because your feedback, if they're gonna give you feedback, that's gonna be kind of the feeling of the general population. So you have to kind of put your pride on the sidelines and accept the feedback from trusted people in your family or in your friend group or somewhere that you trust.

SPEAKER_00 47:45

Nice. Great advice, absolutely great advice, very actionable, very practical. So absolutely love it. Um, folks, uh, podcaster and author, Jennifer Bosma. Jennifer, thanks for coming on this show and uh just for sharing so much information with everybody who really, really needs it. Uh, it's been absolutely delightful, and you're always fun to have on. Thanks for being here.

SPEAKER_01 48:06

Thank you for having me.

SPEAKER_00 48:08

All right, folks, that's been another absolutely wonderful episode of the Right Path Podcast. Uh, folks, this is the place where the truth still matters and words still have power. Um this is also the place uh for all of the authors out there who really do understand that every single page is a step forward towards finding your right path. Until next time.