NOW Conversations - Featuring Conversations with Book Authors with Guest Liz Brewer

 Step into a space where stories unfold, purpose is revealed, and the journey behind the book finally gets a voice.

NOW Conversations invites you into meaningful dialogue with book authors who are doing more than writing books — they are sharing lived experiences, lessons learned, and messages that were meant to be released into the world.

In each episode, we go beyond the surface to explore the real moments behind the manuscript — the doubts, the breakthroughs, the unexpected turns, and the deeper “why” that shaped the words on the page. Through thoughtful questions and authentic conversation, we create room for honesty, reflection, and inspiration.

Whether you're an aspiring author, a leader with a message, or someone who simply loves understanding the story behind the story, NOW Conversations offers a welcoming space to listen, learn, and be encouraged.

Because sometimes, the most powerful part of a book… is the conversation it begins. #NOWConversations #BookPublishing #CEOBookPublishing #LizaMarieGarcia #PublishedAuthor

Publish@cbpteam.com

Liza Marie Garcia | LinkedIn

CEO Book Publishing

CEO Book Publishing

If YOU would like to be featured as a guest please reach out! 

Liza Marie Garcia | LinkedIn

CEO Book Publishing

CEO Book Publishing

publish@cbpteam.com

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 1:33

On stage, how's that? There we go. And let's uh bring Liz to the stage. Thank you for joining us for now conversations.

SPEAKER_01 1:40

Hi, good morning. Thank you for having me.

unknown 1:43

Well, thank you.

SPEAKER_00 1:44

It's not sometimes 9:30 is earlier than other times, right? It depends on what our Friday night was. How are you doing?

SPEAKER_01 1:50

Yeah, especially on a Saturday morning, right? I'm a little busy at work already, but yeah, we get a little lazier on Saturday mornings. But this is this is exciting. Glad to be here.

SPEAKER_00 2:00

Well, well, thank you. And um we've we've met each other in the last three or four months in that. So I know how busy you are. So I'm excited that people can uh get to know about you as book author. So um, so yeah, so let's just jump in. And as I said, three-time book author. And so I want to talk about um mainly I'd like to talk about your book, and it's called uh I love the title so much, 12 Days of Miracles. And I believe I'm not looking at my notes, but it was about 2020, is about when you wrote it, or is that when it came together, correct?

SPEAKER_01 2:34

Well, this is when everything happened, and so I actually wrote it, I want to say in 2024.

SPEAKER_00 2:39

Okay, but when it takes place, right? For 12 Days of Miracles. Well, tell us just uh give us the premise of the book to set the stage.

SPEAKER_01 2:47

So the book is actually about my son, who Tyler, um, during COVID in 2020, when it when the world shut down shortly after what March, um, we had planned our summer vacation, which we have been doing for 20 years, and um we had to reschedule it because uh in the state of Florida, it was the the vacation resorts and stuff were still shut down. And so we had to move our vacation time to the end of June. And so when they reopened everything. And uh just one day into our vacation, my son, who was 25 at the time, he's uh we all got there on Friday night. We were ready to enjoy the week ahead, come uh basically culminating in the 4th of July weekend with our entire family, and on a little uh island, which is you know, you take a you take a shuttle to it, so it's a little island that we've gone to for 20 years. And that evening he fell sick, and so the next morning his um now wife came down as I was preparing breakfast for us to start the day off on Saturday and said that Tyler had been experiencing um just nausea and just wasn't feeling good all night long. And her words were he felt like he did when he was back at the fraternity house at University of Florida, and I thought, well, we they didn't really drink that much the night before, so I was a little concerned, but I thought, well, they've been you know locked down and have they lived in Miami at the time, because that was the other keys they lived in Miami, and we're up here in Tampa Bay, and so basically fast forward throughout the day and the night, he became uh increasingly worse to where a point where we took him to the fire station on the island thinking maybe it was some type of weird symptoms of COVID. Um and they said no, just you know, my son gave who's a fireman gave him some IVs. Um, by 3 a.m. on Sunday morning, he was experiencing facial paralysis, and so by 7 a.m. we um got on the shuttle and took him to the local hospital. And they from there they basically said it could be a brain bleed, it could be um some type of a mask they didn't know. Um, and it was eerily quiet in the hospital because it was COVID and you're really nobody was there. Right. Um fast forward, my husband's customer was the CEO of Brandon Hospital, and so that Sunday morning he called his friend and said, I need your help. My son is we're down here at the beach, and this is what's going on. And he said, You need to get him to Brandon. We'll have a team here ready waiting for him. And so we left the island with my son, my daughter-in-law, and my rest of my family stayed on the island as we took the hour and a half drive by ambulance to Brandon Hospital, um, where he was admitted about 12 hours later. And once he was admitted, we could not be with him. And as a mother, that was absolutely heartbreaking, not knowing what was going on. Um, so the 12 Days of Miracles really was looking back, I realized that there was no way that the things that happened could have happened without the Lord being involved and sending angels literally into the room to help them. And so um, even though he didn't want me to write it, he said, Mom, you know, I don't want that out there. I just felt like people still needed to hear that God is still doing miracles today, and um, it's it's it's just my heart torn into paper saying, This is what the Lord did for my son, and he is doing wonderful today, by the way. But um, it was a very, very scary time. I mean, literally, our lifeline was FaceTime, and the and the cord, the the charger was the lifeline to be able to keep that that phone active to where we can still communicate with him because there was nobody that we thought was actually in the hospital, but it turns out there were many angels that were surrounding him, and that's what you got to read the book about.

SPEAKER_00 6:35

Absolutely. Well, I'm sure people will want to pick it up, and I'll make sure that we have the um the link so people can buy this book. And then you you wrote the book, uh, I am the answer before that. And then also you were in a collaboration book, and we've been uh we've got a couple collabs going on in our company. So that's been a topic that I've been talking about a lot, and that was in her shoes. Um so so let's, you know, I was thinking about the title of your book, and and it's it's just a great one. First of all, you know, the industry says your book titles should, you know, not be more than four words, and really they say three words are the best. So it's four words. So that would you you hit the mark on that with your 12 days of miracles. Um, and you know, there's so much of a science into why people buy books, right? And you know, the the not sale basic, but just the whole thing of how do you attract a reader. I mean, look at the bookshelves behind us, you know, just as an example, right? You go to it, you go to Barnes and Noble, and you know, what book catches your eye? Color, you know, design, title, font, right? So that so I I love that. So the title is so important, um, obviously, which is why why we're talking about this. And so, how did how you know, did you come up with that title? Did you hear it? Did you say it? How did you come up with 12 Days of Miracle as your book title?

SPEAKER_01 7:59

And the 12 Days of Miracles were literally 12 days, and I just felt that that was that was the story, the 12 days, because when he was admitted to the time he was released, he literally went in with unknown what was going on by himself, had to have brain surgery, have the tumor removed by himself, and left there. And and of course, it was months of recovery from that. Um, I'm not saying 12 days and he was healed, it was it was actually years because he experienced a couple seizures afterwards. So um, but the 12 days of miracles just seemed to be, I felt like for me it it told this story. It's 12 days of miracles. Very simple.

SPEAKER_00 8:42

That was so that that's one of the titles then title journeys that came pretty easily. How did uh I am the answer? Did that title come easily?

SPEAKER_01 8:53

That one is is truly God inspired. Um, so I was singing on my worship team on a Sunday morning, and at the time we had four services, and I literally audibly heard the Lord say, I am the answer. And I as I looked around, did anyone else hear this thinking? Because you know, the pastor's on the stage doing his invitation invitation. Um, I heard it again the second service, and I heard it again the third service, and I knew there was something that God was trying to tell me. This was probably 2017. I had gone through since 2006 the loss of four of my family members in all tragic ways, and so I was carrying a lot of grief at the time, and I and I knew he was the answer. There was no no denying the Lord was the answer to the grief that I went through every single time. And so when I heard that, I felt that God was saying, you know, I am the answer, but I didn't know what to do with it. And so, fast forward, um, again, like I said, to 2017, 2018, I was leading one of my Liz Burrow Connections events, and I was at the table passing around the the sheets for the day that we were going to be discussing, and one of my friends said, Hey, my friend is gonna be publishing a book, um, the Yes God book, and would you like to be part of it? And I said, and I had been feeling like God was saying you need to write a book. I didn't know how to write a book, it didn't even seem like something I could even achieve. So when she gave me that invitation, I just felt like that was the door opening, and I said, Yes. So, of course, yes, God, and then through that experience, I knew I needed to start writing about I am the answer. But what's so funny about that title, Lisa, is that as I was writing it, I kept thinking, I'm not the answer. And people are gonna pick it up and go, Oh, kind of sounds narcissistic, you're the answer. So I added my pathway to joy because as I wrote the book, it took me multiple years, it didn't actually get released until um 2020. And when I when I was coming up with the title, I felt that if if I said I am the answer, I think people would just push it away. I'm not interested. But it was through the Lord in each of those experiences and multiple other experiences of grief, because because we know that it's not just loss of love when you grieve, it was five miscarriages, it was some some job situations, it was a multiple of different things that grief um was involved in, and I talk about that in the book. But my pathway to joy was really my my part of it, saying, I am the answer, my pathway to joy. I wanted people to know what it was, what is the pathway to joy, and that's really what the book is about is directing it back to the Lord and saying that it was through him that I had the joy. Because grief tends to remove your joy. You don't have any joy in the morning, you wake up, you feel guilty. All the emotions that go with with grief. And and thank you for inviting me for uh the Griefwise podcast. That was beautiful. Um, because you still process it, grief never goes away. But I hope through the pages of that book, if people will pick it up and say, I am the answer, my pathway to joy, it will make them want to pick it up to find out what is that answer.

SPEAKER_00 12:04

That's beautiful. It's thank you for sharing that journey. Um, not you know, just that I think it's a beautiful, you know, book publishing, brand new debut author journey, you know. And you said just started writing, you know, first it was the climbing the seed of the title and then not knowing as a new author. You're like, do I have enough to write about? Am I supposed to write? Am I good enough to write? How can this come together, right? I mean, any, you know, and it's really liking to, I've got a new client I had a conversation with this week, even very new. I think she's done like a chapter. She's, you know, kind of struggling a bit, just really understanding it. And I think, you know, any new endeavor, we gotta be, gotta give ourselves grace and under, you know, and just kind of, and it's easier said than done, of course, right? When you're in the middle of it, right? But it's especially for people like you. I mean, you're, you know, um, you know, very accomplished, you know, professional, you know, the CEO life that you run and manage so much. So you might have a mindset of, well, I can manage this, and you can do something new, but it's still new, you know. And so and and you know, over the years we've had, you know, a few clients that, you know, come at it that way. And probably I come at things that way. And I have to just say, you know, why don't you just see if it might work out how I don't think it will? You know, and I mean I'm being silly about it, but you know, it's nice that people can hear that, you know, it's why we not can hear, you know, that it took, you know, three years to put it together and then what you shared. And then of course, the the the faith-based professional I am just loves that you're you know, letting your words and your book people bring people closer to God to understand uh his grace and you know, and and in his favor of giving us angels, you know, back to the the first uh the first book, and we're gonna talk about your angel uh work because you are surrounded with angels, but I I'm looking at the clock because we're already getting into it um and we're losing time. So let me just I want to put a bow on the book title discussion and um just to to finish that off. So I want to share with people that um about book titles and what we've done in our journey with authors is sometimes they come to us with book title, like you said, it was obvious it was 12 days of miracles. Um other times though we've struggled, and we struggle less less times than often. But when we do that, I mean we do have a great thing called chat now, chat GPTs now, but before we didn't have that, what would happen is sometimes our author would be in it and they'd be writing, and then all of a sudden they'd write the title. They're like, that's the title. Sometimes as we're editing, I'd have an editor prove it saying, you know, that could be a really good title, right? So it would come through their words in some ways, and then other times um when we've struggled with it, so to speak, is we would like get out of group chat. We would um do polls, right? So sometimes we would do oh a while back we we would do the social media poll. Now that kind of will create a whole firestorm. Sometimes it would stop we got a good title that way once. You know, so it is and what's fun about a title is it is um a good time to really let you dig into what is the exact core message, right? What is the takeaway message? You know, what do what am I trying to even attract the reader about? You know, am I attracting a marathon reader? What would be a word, you know, that they would love? So it's just kind of all things, you know, related to getting into the content, getting into the words and that for titles.

SPEAKER_01 15:50

So yeah, I think I think words are everything. And it certainly, I mean, I look around my office and I have books everywhere. And there's some books that I've bought that I thought I thought it was about one thing and it turned out to be something about completely different, and I lost interest and I put it down and I didn't, I never finished it. So that hard work that that author put into it could have been probably uh with a different title, might have attracted a different reader.

SPEAKER_00 16:15

Yes, could be that. And then what I think, because I've got, you know, we all book readers, I've got a ton of books that are that I started, same thing, and they would, you know, if I go if it takes me down a rabbit trail, I lose interest, right? If it takes me, like you said, if I thought I was going to learn about something and I learned about it in two chapters, and now there's a whole other topic that I'm not interested in, put it down. And then the other thing, you know, that I of course believe it's important to have great editors in your publishing company is that if it's not so really we call it tight, if it's not so tightly written that it really engages the reader. So I will read something that maybe I'm not interested in if it's tightly written and I can get through it and it leads me, I'll stay with it. But as long as editing's not good and not sharp, forget it. I'm done. Close it and donate the book, right? So um that's good, that's a great point. And you clearly, as a three-time author, uh, you have it. So what would you say? Um, what would you say, you know, as you started your very first book? And um, well, first of all, I'll ask you a question I think I know the answer to, and that is it seems like after you wrote your first book, then you for your second book, you're like, okay, I kind of get it. And did you kind of get a little bit of a writing bug where you're like, okay, I could do it, I like it. Tell me that after you did your first yeah, I I think so.

SPEAKER_01 17:35

Um, the first book was was hard. I took, I want to say it took a lot of courage because I was having to go back to the time that a lot of this happened, and it was very painful. And so as you move through grief, you you start to you know forget some some details. I think that's how time heals. Um, so as so writing the book, it was it was kind of hard because it was bringing back a lot of those painful moments, but I knew it was important to share that in order to show people that there is a pathway to joy. Um, the second book was really a joyful book, it was all about you know celebrating the miracles and and remembering the miracles. And so I was in a different emotional state at that point. Um, started off as grief, of course, because you don't know. I talk about in the book that we didn't know if Tyler was gonna make it. I didn't know if it was gonna be another cancer journey, and so starting with that, but then seeing how his his um progress was allowed me to be able to start noticing those miracles. And so it there's there's a twist to that that whole thing with the 12 days of miracles. But um, but yeah, I I wrote it and I I did it in the I finished it in our RB up in Georgia um during the Christmas break. I I literally rewrote it probably three times. I I just felt a lot more, I guess, educated after writing the first and reading my first after it was edited. Um, that some of the time I may have been rambling. And so this book was shorter, it was um less rambling, even less words. Sometimes we use the word that. We think the word that has to be in every sentence. If you remove the word that, you realize the sentence still makes clearer sense.

SPEAKER_00 19:14

Right, it doesn't need it.

SPEAKER_01 19:15

Those little details you don't know until you have somebody who's an editor that's that's telling you you don't need that word, or or just little things like punctuation and stuff. So um I was a little bit more educated, so it made me more excited to just share um more more confidently, I guess, from experience.

SPEAKER_00 19:34

Well, and we tell, you know, what I'll tell a new author. I think I was sharing with you yesterday, we uh started a new beautiful book. Uh, we got to have it ready for their gala in October. And we're gonna I'm gonna move to your gala's coming up in October also. But I was um sharing with the author that as she starts, and it's her first book, as she starts to work with our editor chapter by chapter, usually around chapter four, chapter five, the you'll she'll start to see the writing style. She'll start to see that she doesn't need to put that everywhere in there. She'll start to kind of get it. And and so, and you know, and then by the end of the first book, then typically many of our clients become proli are say, okay, I'm ready for the next one, maybe not tomorrow, which is understandable because it's a big task to publish a book and a big endeavor. Um, but um, I have multiple authors that after that first book, they've uh pushed out many other books. So it it's it it's I think it's obviously I love to be both the book author and I love book publishing. So um I recommend it, right? So we recommend it.

SPEAKER_01 20:40

Absolutely. It's a great way to share your heart, tell the story, and um communicate to people that are interested that you don't have to sit in front of them and share the story. You can let it do at their pace.

SPEAKER_00 20:52

Well, I want to talk about the um the company that you're a CEO, the foundation that you're a CEO for, because we don't have a lot of time, and I really want you to be able to talk about Angel Foundation Florida and um just tell people. I can't believe I didn't know about you until recently, and you've been around now, you're celebrating your 20th year in a gala in October, but please tell everyone everything we need to know about Angel Foundation Florida. And here's the the website down and throw it in the chat too.

SPEAKER_01 21:23

Yes, thank you so much for that. Um, so the the the Angel Foundation came through fruition. Um it started off as the Greater Brandon Community Foundation, and so I was invited as a volunteer. We did a great big golf tournament, and so as a mom of three, you know, busy family businesses, running businesses. Um, I knew that there was a part of my heart that I wanted to give back to my community, but my time was very limited. And so I was able to be part of this volunteer at this event where we were able to raise a lot of money and give it back to the community. We did that through grants. Um, so two years later, as the second golf tournament was taking place, um My father was diagnosed with stage four lung cancer. It started off with a cough on when we were visiting him on Father's Day to by September, he was diagnosed with stage four lung cancer and it had progressed so quickly. Um, at that point, our life was turned upside down. The things that we took for granted um were no longer you know Sunday dinners after church, uh going hanging out. It was spent with hospital visits, chemo, just struggling to just get through the next appointment and holding out hope that he was gonna make it. Sadly, by January he passed away. And so as I came up for air after his his passing and funeral and you know, life never gets back to normal, I realized that there was so many times that I would never have gone to those charities that we were supporting. I I wasn't gonna go looking for food, I wasn't gonna, you know, go to get the resources that the that the government can provide to you. We just figured it out. We were gonna make it work. But thanks to our family and our friends and our church, nothing I mean, things got behind. But um we we basically our grass was mowed, our we had meals dropped off at the house, the things that people just came alongside of you and took care of. Um, and so I went back to the leaders at the time and I said, I feel like there's a gap in the community for people that were just like us, like you, who work, for taking care of their family, they attend church, they're they're they're living their life and they're they're they're just working hard, right? And um when these catastrophic events or life-threatening illnesses happen and life gets turned upside down, they just need a helping hand, not a hand out, but a helping hand. And so that year we created the Foundation Angel program. We had our first evening of hope, and we invited the community to come together and said, Everyone in this room has time, talent, or treasure that you can give. And so, what does that look like? And we we basically gave them a card, they can fill it out, and we literally received a stack of cards back. I think there were 300 people in the room that night. Um, because if people are hungry, they want to help, they want to do something that they could they can do in their power and in their talents and with their dollars. And so we created the angel program, and our first family was a family, uh Patrick's family, who he was battling cancer. It was at end stage. And as we walked up to the house, we saw the grass was high. The air conditioner was very stuffy, it was in July, it was very stuffy. Um, and and his wife expressed how the washing machine was broken. So we we basically walk go into the homes of families, we sit over the dining table, sometimes in the living room, and say, What is it that you need right now? And you'd be surprised. Some people don't want to ask for any help because they they figure there's nobody to help them, and we say, No, we're here to walk alongside of you. And so we brought in famous tape, they donated a new washing machine. We had a line, a lawn care company that came along and said, I lost someone to cancer, I want to give back, I want to help this family. And we were also able to get an air conditioning angel to come out and fix the air conditioning, all donated for these families because when you go through something like this, many times you want to give back, you just don't know where or how. And so we make that possible for businesses in our community to use their their trades and their talents and be able to give back. And then we have volunteers who have maybe gone through such things like this, and that they want to be able to walk alongside a family, give them help and give them hope. And that's our biggest goal is let them know that they're never alone. And so we've we're celebrating our 20th year this year. Uh, it was our first evening of hope in October of 2006, and so it's a it's it's hard for me because I get emotional now because one of the things that we're going to do is um 20 years, we're gonna use 20 as our theme, and we're gonna offer folks to be able to make a $20 donation in honor of someone that they have lost, or maybe somebody that's battling cancer or going through a life-threatening or catastrophic event right now, this year, and that way they can do that in honor. And we'll have beautiful candles set up. Now, the venue doesn't allow for candles, so we're gonna have to figure that out. But I was able to find that candle that we had in honor of my father that year. So it's 20 years, it's been sitting on my mantle. I can't even believe it's been 20 years. As I picked it up, it just brought back that emotion of why we need to let people honor the people that they have lost, but also to support the families that are going through these catastrophic situations and life-threatening illnesses today and in the future. So it's gonna be a beautiful event and in celebration of the thousands of families that we walked alongside of, but also awareness to make sure that no family has to go through it alone. And our goal is to cover the state of Florida with this model and then beyond. We want it to be national at some point.

SPEAKER_00 26:44

Yeah, become a national angel foundation. Um, I love the 20 um the honoring someone that way. I love that. That's fantastic. And of course, we're gonna be there. And I already said I'm by the table, so I'm on the table. I know that they're all, I will actually also publish the link uh as we go live with this, uh, so that everyone listening can come to it and you guys do an amazing job with your evening of hope. Um, and I just know how special this is gonna be, but it's it's just you know, the I I love this joke. I think it so much. I'm probably I'm thinking about probably myself, but you know, the the idea is, you know, how do you hear from God? Well, one of the ways is through his angels on earth, you know, and that is everything. And thank you for taking us through what Angel Foundation Florida does, but you know, it's all these angels, and you even have junior angels, you even have high scholars that come and help the families. And like you said, every family has different needs and there's different ways that people provide their uh, you know, their services, like you said, their talent and their time, not just uh the money, but the money is fantastic because you give them amazing gift cards that help them with what they need, you know, multiplies and and just everything. So um, and and I'm also excited for you to be on griefwise soon um to talk about you know a little bit more about what what what you've experienced in your life and during that grief journey, which is ongoing, there's no end necessarily, but ongoing. So oh my gosh, two more minutes left. Oh no, okay, so I need to have ask you, I need to ask you to help motivate someone that's watching that knows there's a book in them, maybe they have their title and they just um haven't started yet. What would you say to them?

SPEAKER_01 28:35

If you have a story in your heart, it's so practical as open Google, open up a Google Doc, start writing, start writing. Editors are gonna make it beautiful for you if you're not a writer, if you don't feel in your heart, just start writing down what's on your heart and what you want to share, even if it's cooking lessons, there's books about recipes. Um, what are you inspired to write and share with the world? Lisa, you spoke at my Rotary Club and you shared how many people don't know the story, they don't know your story. So even if it's just about you, your legacy, I have four grandchildren now, and I am trying to pour into them every day. Um, but one day I won't be here, and they are not gonna know the stories of when I grew up and where you know my faith began, my faith journey, or or the trials that I've gone through, or the job struggles. And so there's some you have a story and you need to share that with the world. And whether it's just for your own family or if it's gonna be for the world to read, someone's gonna pick that up and you're going to inspire and you're going to challenge them and you're going to give them courage to do the same because the world, there's a story behind every face. Everyone has a story. Find out. Ask God what is that story that you want me to share with the world, and He will show you.

SPEAKER_00 29:47

Thank you. Start writing is the hashtag 100% agree. There is a way you can contact us at CEO Book Publishing. But um, I shouldn't say this, but I will. And if it's not a book that you want to publish your story, then just make a video, make an audio, publish it in a news in a news article. The online magazine online newsletters are the big deal now. So um, all right. Well, thank you so much, Liz. I knew that we'd have so much to talk about, and thank you everyone for watching now uh conversations. We'll see you next Saturday. Thank you again, Liz.

SPEAKER_01 30:21

Thank you, Lisa. Good blessing.