Flashback Friday: Episode 293, how to build a literary life with Zibby Owens.

Writers, if you're paying attention at all, you've heard from Zibby Owens in the past 2 years. She's the host of the Moms Don't Have Time to Read Podcast and the creator of Zibby Media, which at this point includes a magazine, a publishing house that's having a great month with, among other books, The Last Love Note, which KJ highly recommends and an LA-based bookstore. In 2022, Jess talked with Zibby about how she launched her literary life--and as that life gets bigger and bigger, we thought it was time to share her story again. Ever want to know “how she did it”? This episode is our little version of How I Built This, in which we ask Zibby Owens—whose name you surely know by now—about how she turned a desire to be part of the world of books into a one-woman mini book empire.Zibby Owens is the host of Moms Don’t Have Time to Read, a daily podcast featuring interviews with authors that has over 900 episodes. She’s also a Bookstagrammer with 16K followers, the host of a second podcast—Moms Don’t Have Time to Have Sex—the editor of two anthologies, Moms Don’t Have Time To and Moms Don’t Have Time to Have Kids—KJ contributed to that last one—and now the CEO of Zibby Books, a new publishing home for fiction and memoir. She’s a regular contributor to Good Morning America, she’s been called “America’s Top Bookfluencer” and she has two books coming soon: Princess Charming, a picture book, and Booked, a memoir. She’s also got four kids, and they’re kids—elementary and middle school age, not a bunch of independent high schoolers wandering aroundBut.Five years ago Zibby was none of those things (except a mother of four). And that’s what I want to talk about. She’s built a massive literary life, a community, a reputation in just a few years, and—after totally owning the fact that she has help with her kids (heck, not just help, they’re completely gone every other weekend because, divorce sometimes works like that) and also that this isn’t how Zibby earns a living— we go back to the beginning and talk about what it took to get there.Because no matter who you are, you can’t wake up and say, I think I’d like to be America’s Biggest Bookfluencer, and whip out your Amex card and make it happen. You can’t even take your Kardashian self and decide this is what you want and ask your assistant to set it up. This takes work and desire and passion, and we dig into how Zibby started, and how she made things take off.Links from the pod:Lee Carpenter: Red, White, Blue and ElevenAndre Agassi: OpenZibby BooksZibby Books Ambassadors (at bottom of Zibby Books page)#AmReadingZibby: Going There by Katie CouricHungry Hill by Eileen Patricia CurranThe Husbands by Chandler BakerThe Last Season by Jenny Judson & Danielle MahfoodKJ: A Spindle Splintered by Alix E. HarrowJess: Speaking of Race by Celeste HeadleeIt's that time again! Every year Jennie Nash and the Author Accelerator team put together a holiday bundle worth hundreds of dollars for folks who enroll in the Book Coach Certification Program ahead of the new year. Enroll this month to receive a $150 gift card to Better World Books, access to their $99 course the One-Page Book Coaching Business Plan Challenge, a copy of Jennie’s Blueprint book in your genre, and MORE.And did we mention you can now pre-enroll in Author Accelerator’s Memoir Certification Program? The course opens in March 2024, but if you enroll this month, you’ll get $600 off the cost of enrollment – which is certainly something to be jolly for!When you enroll in the Book Coach Certification program, you’ll gain access to a thriving community of friends and colleagues, more than 100 hours of training, videos, case studies, and worksheets to teach you the key editorial skills, client-management strategies, and the tools needed to help writers reach their goals and to help you start a thriving book coaching business. So, whether you’re looking to expand your writing skills or start your new year with a new career, there is no better time to start your journey. Visit bookcoaches.com/podcast to get your special offer. This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit amwriting.substack.com/subscribe