June 18, 2025 • 36 mins
Vivian L. King is an award-winning author, speaker, communications consultant and former television journalist who wrote, “When the Words Suddenly Stopped: Finding My Voice Again After a Massive Stroke.” The book was a bestseller after Vivian appeared on a national TV talk show and has received awards from various organizations, including for the production and narration of her audiobook. Vivian has now written her first children’s book, born of her passion for being polite and inspiring children to become good citizens. Before founding Vivian L. King Connections, Vivian was VP of Community Relations for the largest health care system in Wisconsin and Director of Public Affairs for the largest retailer in Wisconsin
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:02):
Hello everyone, and welcome to I'm gonna go with the
Writer's Class. I feel like we're gonna learn a lot
about writing. I like, I know, darn well we're not.
It's gonna be an And I thought podcast. You know
I have four of them, and yes, that means I
get to brag about having four lovely podcasts. And since
I recognized doing my last podcast, I should probably name them.
(00:24):
You know, I've been doing this for almost a decade
now and naming them has never come to my mind.
Like you remember, a couple of about two years ago,
I decided that I should name the podcast actually what
it's named, yeah, because it would be named. And I thought,
and I'd be like, welcome to the women's Cave, and
people like I can't find it, and I'm like, I
don't know what's wrong with them. And then I recognize
if you have an anti podcast named, and I thought,
(00:45):
you should say the podcast name is. And I thought,
so there you go, So we have, And I thought,
Ladystaal Podcasts meet Hollywood Mondays and the Writer's Class. Now,
if you really want to get funny and jiggy with it,
oh wait, that's way back, that's oh I need to
stop watching old Will Smith stuff. If you really want
(01:07):
to gonjiguity, you can listen to the author reality show,
which you know, four authors actually went and competed for
a traditional publishing contract and we have four CEOs of
publishing houses as judges. That was fun. You did not
care about that, but I felt like I needed to brag,
so you had to hear it. Ha ha, I am
(01:28):
well on At half of the end, I thought Lea
used and high five to me for remembering to introduce
myself with a little dance. With a little dance. Oh no,
that looked like I was punching myself in the right
and the left cheek at the same time. Lord have mercy.
Oh and I wrote books. Go figure an author who
writes books. There's And I thought divorce was bad, and
I thought being chronicle was easy. If only are mere
(01:49):
Memory in Verse, Foreign Coffee's, Widdow's Web and Widdow's Debt.
And if you're counting that six books, And if you've
been here for a while, you know we got a
few more. So you can get the rest of the seventeen,
because we obviously have nothing else to do with our
life but write books at www. Dot and I thought
ladies dot com. But you know what, You're not here
(02:10):
to hear about me, which is sad because you needed
to hear another you know what in here, I'm about
four or five of them. We should have equaled seven total,
but today we're not gonna make that count. You're here
to hear about our wonderful guests. Wonderful guess. Would you
like to introduce yourself?
Speaker 2 (02:24):
I would, But before I do, I want to say
I am just tired thinking about all the things that
you do. You are amazing. But she told me to
introduce myself. So my name is Vivian King. I am
an author, and I am a communications consultant. I'm a
former television journalist and just an individual who loves life.
(02:47):
And because I had a stroke in twenty thirteen, I
love life even more because I survived that, and so
I know we'll be talking about that later on. This
is the book that I wrote after that. It's called
When the Words Suddenly Stopped Finding my voice again after
a massive stroke. And because I found that voice, I
(03:10):
can sit here and talk to you today. So thanks.
Speaker 1 (03:13):
With the same oh, I'm sorry, with the exact same
cadence as a journalist. I'm jealous. I'm very jealous. I
have not had a stroke, and I'm like, I can't
do that.
Speaker 2 (03:26):
Oh that's nothing. But the Lord God was with me
and uh and I've been. I was grateful before, but
I'm even more grateful now.
Speaker 1 (03:37):
Oh my goodness, I can't imagine how grateful now I
heard I heard about though, you know, I should be
talking about the book thing, but this is me. I
tend to go every which way. But I heard former journalists. Yeah, yeah,
how did that happen? Did that come from the communications
consultant or the communications consultant after the former journalists?
Speaker 2 (03:59):
The communications consultant is after the former journalist. You know.
I grew up in Saint Louis, Missouri, and I ended
up deciding to go to the University of Missouri Columbia
to study journalism. So I have a Bachelor of Journalism
from the University of Missouri Columbia, and I worked in
(04:20):
television in different markets. I was started off small in Alexandria, Louisiana.
Then I went to Tyler, Texas. Then I went to
Battle Creek, Michigan, and then I ended up in Milwaukee
and was hired as the education reporter at WTMJTV, the
NBC affiliate, and later on ended up anchoring the midday show,
(04:43):
the morning show, having my own segment developing it called Vivsview.
And I just had a great time for about about
ten and a half years at Channel four. But several
years before that I worked in smaller markets, so it
was a very fun career. But things change, so I
(05:03):
ended up doing work at a grocery chain. I was
the director of public affairs, and then I ended up
being vice president of community relations at a healthcare system
here in Milwaukee. And then I had my stroke, and
then I decided after that to write the book, and
that's how I ended up becoming an author and then
(05:25):
a communications consultant.
Speaker 1 (05:27):
This is how you can tell that she's a journalist.
She made it round, she made it come on back
around by itself. She did her own segue.
Speaker 2 (05:36):
I have produced many shows segments.
Speaker 1 (05:40):
She did her own segue. So now I'm back to
the book where you know, I wasn't trying to go
on the Oh my goodness. So going from the more
of an oral and visual medium and then going into
pr and now into writing, did any of those skills
help you as you sat down to write the book.
Speaker 2 (06:02):
Absolutely absolutely. You know. The thing that I learned about journalism,
especially when I left television, is that I had transferable skills.
And I got to tell you that little story because
I was walking with some friends, you know, we regularly walk,
(06:23):
you know, getting some exercise in, you know, many years
ago in two thousand and five, and one of them said, oh,
I've recommended you for a job at this grocery chain.
And I said, oh, that's great, but I just got
this new show. I'm having a great time blah blah blah, right,
(06:44):
and she says, okay, well, you know I told them
if they hired you, that you should be a VP.
And I said, you need to be my agent and
just kind of laughed it off. Well, a week later,
this woman called me and said that she was a
consultant with this grocery chain and that the CEO wanted
to meet with me. Fast forward to me talking to
(07:05):
a friend who at the time worked at an executive
search firm, and I called him and I said, the
CEO wants to meet with me. What do I say?
And he gave me some advice that I give everybody
when I do speeches. Et cetera. He said, look at
your resume and write a one page Vivian Kings story
(07:27):
and you're not going to memorize it, but you read
that over and over and it will just become conversational
and you'll be able to tell your story. And so
I said, well, I can write a story. I write
stories every day. So I wrote this one page story
and I went to this interview and it was funny
(07:48):
because the CEO, you know, was asking me about, you know,
myself and what I did. And I was, you know,
excited because I had just gotten this promotion blah blah blah,
and you know it was you know, I was excited.
And he kind of had this look you know when
you interview people, you know, when you're about your boring them,
or you know, when something has changed, and he kind
(08:08):
of looked like, so, why are you here? And so
I saw that little, you know, that little look like
why am I even talking to you? And I said,
so you're probably wondering why I'm here, and I said,
it's because I'm a faithful person and you never know
from which direction your next blessing will be. And so
I felt that I owed it to myself to find
(08:29):
out what you had to offer, and so then he
smiled and then he said, well, this is what I need,
and he said something that I now call a buzzword
because they were words that I had used in the
story that I wrote about myself. And at that moment,
I said, I'm going to get this job because I
(08:52):
could just talk about it extemporaneously with no problem. We
talked for an hour and a half and I ended
up getting the job. So it was great.
Speaker 1 (09:00):
What is amazing, insanely amazing and wonderful. Law Oh my god.
Speaker 2 (09:08):
So I tell everybody that because it's like we all
have a story, write our story and be able to
talk about it easily.
Speaker 1 (09:16):
Exactly, and that does make it more conversational. I'm not
gonna lie. I just thought about it while you were
sitting here, and I was like, I need to do
that so I could be like, you know, flexible in
what I'm doing and saying, and not just like let
me list my accomplishment exactly exactly.
Speaker 2 (09:28):
You can say how you write about how this related
to this, and I learned this, and you can see
that all the skills that you have are transferable, and
so you know, my my journalism skills definitely helped me
in being a public relations practitioner, in community relations, and
(09:50):
definitely in writing my book.
Speaker 1 (09:52):
So this brings me to the subject that the ah
tongue get ready? Okay, sorry, So this brings me to
the question I have to ask all my guests, what
are the three top pieces of advice you would give
someone who's going to write a debut novel.
Speaker 2 (10:08):
Hmmm, that is a good that's a good question. You know.
I would say, you know, have a clear idea of
what you want to write about, and make sure you
know why you are writing about it and what impact
(10:28):
it will have, because you know, I can sit down
and write everything that's happened in my life, but how
does how does it impact the reader? I wrote my
book because people didn't know about the link between birth
control pills over the age of forty and blood clots
(10:49):
that caused stroke, and so because too many people didn't
know about it, I wanted to write about my story
and tell them about that. So you know, have a
clear idea of why you want to write the story. Secondly,
I would say trust the process and the timing, because
(11:10):
so many times, authors, including myself, have a timeline which
a timeline is good. I'm not saying don't have a timeline,
but we can say I want to have this done
by this and this done by this date, and this
done by this date. I want to publish at this time.
And that's an outline, right, that's an outline for your book.
(11:34):
But as you know, you know, things change. I remember
that I was sending out to beta readers and thinking, Okay,
I'm going to get it back at this time and
launch by this date. And when I got my beta
readers to return their information, they had some questions for me,
(11:55):
and it made me have to write two additional chapters.
And I didn't feel like it at first because I
hadn't thought about that, and so it took me a
month to even start writing those two chapters. But because
I had to do that, and it, of course it
delayed everything, but it made the book much better. And
so trust the timing and then just realize that your
(12:19):
story matters to somebody. It could be somebody who had
another stroke.
Speaker 1 (12:26):
Who you know.
Speaker 2 (12:27):
But your audience may not be my audience. Somebody You're
writing your book for somebody, And just realize that your
audience is out there, and think about who that audience
might be.
Speaker 1 (12:42):
Thank you, thank you for that, because you think about
how many books already on the subject, and everyone was like, oh,
bring something new. You know what's you.
Speaker 2 (12:49):
Exactly, absolutely absolutely.
Speaker 1 (12:53):
And you're gonna have you want to see it completely
different from somebody else. The Oh my goodness. I just
want to say the first, can you do recognize that
when they give you birth control pills, they do tell
you that there is a chance of stroke, even before
forty there's a chance of people who have issues with
their heart they cannot take birth control. Yeah, it's a
chance of people with blood vegetab issues they cannot take
(13:14):
birth control. It does a number on the.
Speaker 2 (13:16):
Body, it does. But when I tell you, but if
you need them, please take them right when I tell
you though that because I, you know, was first of all,
the doctor said I was relatively young to have a stroke,
and of course that's relative, and I did not think
(13:37):
I had history of stroke in my family. I was
relatively active, I had never really had a health issue,
so people were surprised that I had a stroke. And
so of course once I survived and got back to work,
everybody says, what caused it? What caused it? And I
tell them that. And when I say, half the women said,
(13:57):
oh yeah, my doctor told me that in my mid
thirties and took me off birth control pills and said
I was too young to have a stroke. But the
other half were like me, and they looked at me
wide eyed and said, what, I'm over forty and still
taking birth control pills. And I didn't know that. So
because there was such a wide disparity, I was like, Okay,
(14:21):
I need to tell my story. And you know I
should have known that, you know, because you know it's
in the fine print. But I was like, who, Like,
I didn't read the fine print. I had been on
it before, and somehow that got kind of lost in
the shuffle. So and apparently it got lost in the
shuffle for others because people are still reading my book
(14:44):
and saying the same thing and thanking me and saying
now they're having conversations with their doctors. So so I'm
glad I followed God's lead and wrote the book.
Speaker 1 (14:57):
Most people, I don't think most people pay attention to it,
but like, yeah, I'm going to brag about myself. You know,
I've been studying medicine often only since I was five
years old. MM hmm, you heard me, right, I said, fine,
And so like I'm always worried about heart health and strokes,
that that's yeah thing. And then I'm gonna share a
(15:18):
little bit about myself. I do have heart issues. I
always had them. Always worried about birth control, heart health, stroke,
blood clots. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (15:29):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (15:29):
And the reason I knew about it. I would tell
other people about it. But you know, like at that time,
I was twenty some years old, and they're like, yeah,
I'm not dying. I mean, come on, we're in our twenties.
We're like in distructions.
Speaker 2 (15:39):
We think we're invincible, right, and if we don't have
somebody in our family that has you know, has that
issue there, you know, if there's not a reason for
us to really pay attention to the doctor, we're just like, oh,
i need birth control fiells and so I'm going to
take them. And you're not thinking about it, especially if
nothing has ever happened to you it, so you're not
(16:01):
thinking about that when you are just you haven't had
a health issue. So that's why I said I needed
to write the book, because there were too many of
us who you know, did not know it and did
not pay attention. Maybe the doctors didn't say it, and
I don't, like, yeah, I don't.
Speaker 1 (16:18):
I actually the end, it's on the end of the
birth control commercials on television. M h, it's definitely on
the end. I was like, no, right, I mean, I
mean you could, like, you could definitely look for a
different kind and different style, and you know, there's so
much going on that you could look for. But I
(16:39):
don't know where I'm having an issue. I'm having a
chit chat about birth control. Well, that's the right, I mean, obviously,
it's because it goes with the book.
Speaker 2 (16:48):
Yep, it goes with the book. And and the thing is,
you know, not everybody reads the fine print. Not everybody
you know, you know has had an issue or known
about somebody, so you know there, that's why, that's why
this information is out here. And you know, people get
information in different ways. And so if the doctor didn't
(17:13):
say anything, and your friends haven't said anything, or your
mom hasn't said anything, you know, I hope my book
lets you know, Okay, this is something you need to
pay attention to because I think there are a lot
of women out there just like me, you know, single,
not even you know, concerned about certain things, and this
(17:33):
is this is for them.
Speaker 1 (17:35):
I want to thank you, firs someone for sharing this
bit of information and like in a way that you
can take it in as a narrative, not that someone
being like and I'm telling you you know right, we
can take the narrative. Remember that we can survive this.
You know the signs, get help, Know that you can
get back to life.
Speaker 2 (17:55):
Absolutely absolutely, because people today, you know, who meet me
and don't know my story, when they find out that
I have a struck, had a stroke, they are shocked.
Like yesterday, my condo association had a little gathering and
my mom and I went and somehow my book came
(18:17):
up and people were like, what, you had a stroke.
It doesn't seem that way, and I was like, well
it happened, so you know, I'm just like I said before,
grateful to God that he spared me and spared my life.
And I think he did it so that I could
share this information because there were so many people who
(18:38):
didn't realize, like I said, the link between birth control
pills and blood clots and strokes.
Speaker 1 (18:44):
It's very important to know. I mean it's important to know.
I think all of our meds, but all of the
side effects for all the meds. There's just so many lists,
you knowation I think there.
Speaker 2 (18:58):
I think there are more commercials on medication today than
I remember, or either if they were out there before,
I wasn't necessarily listening to them, you know what I mean,
Because once I had to take warfaring, I heard all
the commercials about warfaring and and similar medication, and I'm like, oh,
(19:23):
I never heard that before. You know, It's kind of
like when you get a new car and you haven't
seen that car before, but as soon as you get one,
you see every car like yours on the highway. I
think it's the same way with you know, when you
when you've had a health issue, you start to listen
to different things in a different.
Speaker 1 (19:40):
Way exactly exactly you do. So now let's get back
to like the actual ways of writing this. So when
you sat down the writer, how did you organize the story?
Speaker 2 (19:52):
So I, you know, I first talked about well, first
of all, I I wrote the first chapter, which is a
short chapter because it is from my perspective on that day.
And of course that day I get up, I rushed
(20:16):
to this girl Scout's breakfast, and then I collapse, and
so it's probably like a page and a half, right,
or maybe two and a half pages or something like that.
And after I wrote that, I said to myself, oh, well,
I don't know what happened next, because I was in
neurological I see you for ten days and in the
hospital for a total of thirty two days, so I
(20:38):
was really out of it for a ten of those days,
and so I need to know what happened. And that's
when my journalistic skills came into play, because I said, okay,
I need to interview the people that were around me
and that helped me recover. And so I listed about
(20:58):
eleven people, I think, and I started interviewing them and
it was interesting because then they started telling me about
other people that did something that I had no idea.
And then so I ended up interviewing twenty two people,
(21:18):
which who had stories about what happened. And I remember
calling this one friend and I said, I hear that
you were instrumental in getting something getting somebody to the
hospital for me, and she and I want to talk
to you about it, and she said I was waiting
(21:41):
for your call. Now. I didn't even start to write
this book until five years after right, so I was
interviewing her. She had waited for five years for me
to call and say, I want to know about this,
and so, you know, it was just that kind an
organic process. So I interviewed people, I logged, you know,
(22:06):
I felt like I was back at the television station.
I interviewed everybody. I listened to their interviews. I logged
their interviews. And as I you know, listened and logged,
then I was able to really fill in the gaps
for everything. So you know, what one person remembered, then
(22:26):
the other person kind of remembered it in a different way.
But I could really fill in the gaps, and it
really gave me the sense of what happened on that
day and the ten days after that that I that I,
you know, had lost because I was in neurological ICU.
So so it was really very cathartic to really learn
(22:49):
what happened. And I think, you know, as a journalist,
you're always seeking the truth because everybody says, did that
traumatize you? And it didn't, because like I'm still a journalist,
you know, whether I work at a television station or not.
Journalism was my first love and so I think God
revealed to me that, you know what I want to
(23:12):
know about what happened, and it was at a time
when my heart and my mind could handle it. So
I was very very grateful that my friends were willing
to help me tell this story.
Speaker 1 (23:27):
That's an amazing way to do this. Now I'm sorry,
I should be called I should be wrapping up the
interview right now. That is what I should be doing.
So there is no clock, you know, running down my segment.
I'm not going to do it.
Speaker 2 (23:43):
Okay, I'm here for.
Speaker 1 (23:46):
A mid afternoon show, like a lifestyle show. Yeah, what
was that like to have that? And then a second question,
which is very important right now? What was it light
to have it? And the second question is how did
you pick your guest? Because you know, every author wants
(24:07):
to get on TV for their book, so we need
to know that information that's true.
Speaker 2 (24:11):
And so you know, this was before you know, of course,
this was way before I was an author. But I
had this idea, you know, to do segments in the
midday show, and so I pitched them because you know,
(24:31):
I was I was a co anchor, and so you know,
they were looking for ideas and I said, I would
like to have, you know, a show, a segment called
so it was really a segment within our midday show
and it also aired in the morning show, and it
was called Vivsview. And I just pitched things that I
wanted to do. So I'm a foodie and I love
(24:53):
restaurants and great food, and so on Monday, Vivsview did
lunch and so we would highlight you know, local restaurants,
new ones, staples. It was really great and so every
like all my friends when I left television, they were like, well,
how are we going to get great tables at the restaurants?
(25:15):
And I was like, is that all you care about?
But it was really fun. We did Vivsview did lunch Tuesday.
What did I do on Tuesday? I can't remember what
Tuesday was, but one day was travel. Thursday was travel
Thursday because I love to travel as well, and so
(25:36):
I have traveled all over the world and continue to travel.
In fact, I just got back from from Brazil in
late April and early May, and so you know, but
I've been to Africa, I've been to So, I've been
to I've been to all. I've been to all but
one of the continents and so that's my My last
goal is to at least get to UH Antarctica. So
(26:00):
so that's one thing. So Thursday was travel Thursday, and
and I just would I remember we went to Quito, Ecuador,
and so I wrote that trip off because I ended
up doing a story on keyto Ecuador, and so I
was like that worked.
Speaker 1 (26:16):
Out well, was a cool place to travel.
Speaker 2 (26:19):
It was really fun. I had the best payea there,
Oh my gosh, it was so good. And then I
would do when when there were different celebrities coming into town,
I would do like a celebrity show. So you know,
I interviewed DL Hughlely, I did you know, a segment
(26:41):
on UH during Mother's Day. One week, I did celebrity
moms that were connected to Milwaukee. So I ended up
at the time Eric Benet's mother, Eric Bana, is from Milwaukee,
and so I interviewed his mom and you know others
as well. So it was really fun. And then you know,
I just decided to do whatever I wanted to do,
(27:05):
so whatever I was interested in, and because I had
had such seniority at the station, they were like, okay,
go with it. That's a great idea. And so it
was really very fun. It was like towards my latter
years at Channel four, but it was like super super fun.
Speaker 1 (27:22):
Oh my goodness, that sounds absolutely amazing. Now, do you
have any hints or any suggestions on how authors can
make themselves presentable to morning shows or mid afternoon lifestyle shows.
Speaker 2 (27:34):
Absolutely, so when I you know, I'll tell you this.
So when I launched my book, when the words suddenly
stopped finding my stroke again, I mean finding my voice
again after a massive stroke, you know, I really looked
at Okay, the first time I launched, you know, just
I launched it in It was in March. In fact,
(27:56):
it launched March twenty fourth twenty which, if you remember,
was the first week of the shutdown because of COVID.
So I had to cancel all of my appearances. So
I had to launch online. But I was just like like, okay,
(28:18):
what am I gonna do? So I launched online, but
I did a news release, you know, to say that,
you know, former television journalist loses her voice, YadA, YadA, YadA.
So then because I had to you know, that was
the first that was the first time, you know, my launch.
But then May was coming up, so that gave me
(28:41):
an opportunity to say, you know, May is Stroke Awareness Month.
So I relaunched the idea in May for Stroke Awareness
Month and was able to, you know, get on Good
Morning America, which was amazing. And so what I would
say is, you know you're gonna get you know, you're
(29:03):
gonna get probably more nose than yes is. But once
you get a yes, you like milk that for all
you can. Right, because I had that segment I posted
on on my social media, on my website, you know,
I can now say as seen on Good Morning America.
So you can do all those things, and you just
(29:28):
gotta kind of leverage that calendar, like, you know, whatever
your topic is. You know, if you're writing about domestic violence,
there's a month for domestic Violence Awareness month. You know what,
you know, look and see what what naturally will come
to you as far as you know what your topic is,
and so you can usually leverage that. And then you know,
(29:51):
if you're the first in your you know, sometimes people
just launch at home, right, you know, your hometown publications
or radio stations or television stations. They have segments and
so it's like give them an idea of what your
book is. But you've got to have a hook, so
try to find a hook that kind of gets somebody's attention.
Speaker 1 (30:16):
Thank you so much for that information. I really really
appreciate that. I'm sorry. I love hearing about how to
get on television because it's long as things to do. Yeah,
I fairly enjoy it. In case you yet, nah, I
think I'm bragging about myself this entire time.
Speaker 2 (30:34):
We got our own horn. Some authors don't want to
do that, and so, oh, that's never been my problem
in tell but you know, I'm sure you know many
authors who are like, I don't know, and uh, you know,
if you're not gonna toot your own horn, then other
people are not gonna want to you know, they're not
(30:55):
going to know about you.
Speaker 1 (30:57):
Just just look up there, you go, right about there,
I have a whole magazine with me in it, and
then over this side there's a magazine with me in it,
and then on that side there was supposed to be
another one, but I haven't put it up yet. I
feel like I'm doing a lot of touting just right
there in the background.
Speaker 2 (31:12):
Idea.
Speaker 1 (31:15):
Absolutely so, can you tell us where we can find
out more about you and about the book?
Speaker 2 (31:21):
Absolutely? You can visit my website at Vivianlking dot com.
Of course, that has links to me on Amazon and
Barnes and Noble, and you can find me on LinkedIn
and it also my homepage at the bottom of it.
It connects to all of my social media, so you
can connect with me there and uh and yeah, Vivianlking
(31:45):
dot com you can find everything out about me that
you want. Awesome.
Speaker 1 (31:51):
I am loving this. Thank you so much. Everyone, Please
go to Vivianlking dot com. Not only does she have
a book about stroke, she has a book about for
children as well. Can you can we see that book? Real?
Speaker 2 (32:00):
Absolutely? I like you never asked, so here it is.
This is my first children's book. It's called Grace Welcomes
the Lady next Door Book one and the Growing Up
Polite series. And I just have a pet peeve about
rude people. And you know that this country has devolved
(32:22):
into a very rude country. I mean, I don't even
really want to go into all of it, but you know,
when you have adults behaving badly, you know they are
behaving in ways that we would not teach our kids
to do. And so I thought we needed to go
back to the basics. And there are several kids who
(32:45):
may not have grown up in a family like mine,
where my mom and my grandmother, you know, they made
sure that I said please and thank you and treated
people and the way that I wanted to be treated.
But if you don't have people teaching you that at home,
you know, and for whatever reason, I wanted to give
(33:08):
those students something to read and learn about manners the
way that I did. So if they didn't learn about
it at home, they can learn about it in my book.
And when I read to children, it is so wonderful,
like they give me life. They give me life because
they pick out the themes so easily, and you know,
(33:29):
they pick out things that you know, I didn't you know,
even sometimes think about. But you know, my story, you know,
teaches about manners. But it's also Grace welcomes the lady
next door. It's also about moving to a new place
and being a new person in a city, and and
you know, just it talks about grief because Grace has
lost her mom. Her mom passed away and so that's
(33:52):
why they moved and and so it's it just really
talks about a lot lot of different things. And I
love the lessons. And so this is book one and
book two I've already written. I'm waiting for the illustrator
to send the drawings and illustrations, and hopefully it will
(34:12):
be out later this year. And it's grace and the
thank you note so oh my goodness, oh.
Speaker 1 (34:19):
And the thank you notes. That is an art that
is practically dead.
Speaker 2 (34:22):
Absolutely, But you know, just think if you're somebody who
who sends a handwritten thank you note or even just
to to you know, send a thank you note at all? Right,
people are that that is a lost art.
Speaker 1 (34:38):
It truly, truly is. I mean, we are the ladies.
So therefore we have stacks of about a thousand and
some thank you notes because we do have to send
that a.
Speaker 2 (34:45):
Lot lowly you do, and I need to write about you, guys.
I've never I'll be looking. I'll be looking when I'm
with you.
Speaker 1 (35:01):
Oh, I don't know if we'll have lady like behavior.
There's a bar.
Speaker 2 (35:07):
You can still you can.
Speaker 1 (35:09):
It was like I know everyone has said, you're always
a lovely lady who knows how to handle her bourbon exactly.
Speaker 2 (35:15):
See thank you kindly.
Speaker 1 (35:19):
One more time? Tell us the website before I wrap
it up for us over here.
Speaker 2 (35:23):
The website is Vivianlking dot com and I would welcome
you coming to visit and sending me a note in
the chat, So that would be great.
Speaker 1 (35:32):
Awesome, Okay, you guys, I'm well known on one half
of the at I thought ladies, you can find out
everything that your ladies are doing at www dot and
I thought ladies dot com. While you're there, take a
moment and go down to the bottom of the page
and see the charities that we probably support. It doesn't
mean that you have to give them money in order
to support them. We asked that you support them as well. Again,
(35:52):
not money. It could be time, or it could be information.
Because we found out one one place needed help with
grants and turns out we knew someone and they were like,
I can help with that, and I was like, hey,
look at that. It's not money, it's just knowledge. So hey,
if you can't do that, then you know money always works.
We thank you in advance for supporting them. Remember that
wisdom is all around you if you're open to finding
(36:12):
it and accepting it. So peace and love you guys
from Wilnona and the Missing Jade. Oh yeah, thanks for listening.
Hello everyone, and welcome to I'm gonna go with the
Writer's Class. I feel like we're gonna learn a lot
about writing. I like, I know, darn well we're not.
It's gonna be an And I thought podcast. You know
I have four of them, and yes, that means I
get to brag about having four lovely podcasts. And since
I recognized doing my last podcast, I should probably name them.
(00:24):
You know, I've been doing this for almost a decade
now and naming them has never come to my mind.
Like you remember, a couple of about two years ago,
I decided that I should name the podcast actually what
it's named, yeah, because it would be named. And I thought,
and I'd be like, welcome to the women's Cave, and
people like I can't find it, and I'm like, I
don't know what's wrong with them. And then I recognize
if you have an anti podcast named, and I thought,
(00:45):
you should say the podcast name is. And I thought,
so there you go, So we have, And I thought,
Ladystaal Podcasts meet Hollywood Mondays and the Writer's Class. Now,
if you really want to get funny and jiggy with it,
oh wait, that's way back, that's oh I need to
stop watching old Will Smith stuff. If you really want
(01:07):
to gonjiguity, you can listen to the author reality show,
which you know, four authors actually went and competed for
a traditional publishing contract and we have four CEOs of
publishing houses as judges. That was fun. You did not
care about that, but I felt like I needed to brag,
so you had to hear it. Ha ha, I am
(01:28):
well on At half of the end, I thought Lea
used and high five to me for remembering to introduce
myself with a little dance. With a little dance. Oh no,
that looked like I was punching myself in the right
and the left cheek at the same time. Lord have mercy.
Oh and I wrote books. Go figure an author who
writes books. There's And I thought divorce was bad, and
I thought being chronicle was easy. If only are mere
(01:49):
Memory in Verse, Foreign Coffee's, Widdow's Web and Widdow's Debt.
And if you're counting that six books, And if you've
been here for a while, you know we got a
few more. So you can get the rest of the seventeen,
because we obviously have nothing else to do with our
life but write books at www. Dot and I thought
ladies dot com. But you know what, You're not here
(02:10):
to hear about me, which is sad because you needed
to hear another you know what in here, I'm about
four or five of them. We should have equaled seven total,
but today we're not gonna make that count. You're here
to hear about our wonderful guests. Wonderful guess. Would you
like to introduce yourself?
Speaker 2 (02:24):
I would, But before I do, I want to say
I am just tired thinking about all the things that
you do. You are amazing. But she told me to
introduce myself. So my name is Vivian King. I am
an author, and I am a communications consultant. I'm a
former television journalist and just an individual who loves life.
(02:47):
And because I had a stroke in twenty thirteen, I
love life even more because I survived that, and so
I know we'll be talking about that later on. This
is the book that I wrote after that. It's called
When the Words Suddenly Stopped Finding my voice again after
a massive stroke. And because I found that voice, I
(03:10):
can sit here and talk to you today. So thanks.
Speaker 1 (03:13):
With the same oh, I'm sorry, with the exact same
cadence as a journalist. I'm jealous. I'm very jealous. I
have not had a stroke, and I'm like, I can't
do that.
Speaker 2 (03:26):
Oh that's nothing. But the Lord God was with me
and uh and I've been. I was grateful before, but
I'm even more grateful now.
Speaker 1 (03:37):
Oh my goodness, I can't imagine how grateful now I
heard I heard about though, you know, I should be
talking about the book thing, but this is me. I
tend to go every which way. But I heard former journalists. Yeah, yeah,
how did that happen? Did that come from the communications
consultant or the communications consultant after the former journalists?
Speaker 2 (03:59):
The communications consultant is after the former journalist. You know.
I grew up in Saint Louis, Missouri, and I ended
up deciding to go to the University of Missouri Columbia
to study journalism. So I have a Bachelor of Journalism
from the University of Missouri Columbia, and I worked in
(04:20):
television in different markets. I was started off small in Alexandria, Louisiana.
Then I went to Tyler, Texas. Then I went to
Battle Creek, Michigan, and then I ended up in Milwaukee
and was hired as the education reporter at WTMJTV, the
NBC affiliate, and later on ended up anchoring the midday show,
(04:43):
the morning show, having my own segment developing it called Vivsview.
And I just had a great time for about about
ten and a half years at Channel four. But several
years before that I worked in smaller markets, so it
was a very fun career. But things change, so I
(05:03):
ended up doing work at a grocery chain. I was
the director of public affairs, and then I ended up
being vice president of community relations at a healthcare system
here in Milwaukee. And then I had my stroke, and
then I decided after that to write the book, and
that's how I ended up becoming an author and then
(05:25):
a communications consultant.
Speaker 1 (05:27):
This is how you can tell that she's a journalist.
She made it round, she made it come on back
around by itself. She did her own segue.
Speaker 2 (05:36):
I have produced many shows segments.
Speaker 1 (05:40):
She did her own segue. So now I'm back to
the book where you know, I wasn't trying to go
on the Oh my goodness. So going from the more
of an oral and visual medium and then going into
pr and now into writing, did any of those skills
help you as you sat down to write the book.
Speaker 2 (06:02):
Absolutely absolutely. You know. The thing that I learned about journalism,
especially when I left television, is that I had transferable skills.
And I got to tell you that little story because
I was walking with some friends, you know, we regularly walk,
(06:23):
you know, getting some exercise in, you know, many years
ago in two thousand and five, and one of them said, oh,
I've recommended you for a job at this grocery chain.
And I said, oh, that's great, but I just got
this new show. I'm having a great time blah blah blah, right,
(06:44):
and she says, okay, well, you know I told them
if they hired you, that you should be a VP.
And I said, you need to be my agent and
just kind of laughed it off. Well, a week later,
this woman called me and said that she was a
consultant with this grocery chain and that the CEO wanted
to meet with me. Fast forward to me talking to
(07:05):
a friend who at the time worked at an executive
search firm, and I called him and I said, the
CEO wants to meet with me. What do I say?
And he gave me some advice that I give everybody
when I do speeches. Et cetera. He said, look at
your resume and write a one page Vivian Kings story
(07:27):
and you're not going to memorize it, but you read
that over and over and it will just become conversational
and you'll be able to tell your story. And so
I said, well, I can write a story. I write
stories every day. So I wrote this one page story
and I went to this interview and it was funny
(07:48):
because the CEO, you know, was asking me about, you know,
myself and what I did. And I was, you know,
excited because I had just gotten this promotion blah blah blah,
and you know it was you know, I was excited.
And he kind of had this look you know when
you interview people, you know, when you're about your boring them,
or you know, when something has changed, and he kind
(08:08):
of looked like, so, why are you here? And so
I saw that little, you know, that little look like
why am I even talking to you? And I said,
so you're probably wondering why I'm here, and I said,
it's because I'm a faithful person and you never know
from which direction your next blessing will be. And so
I felt that I owed it to myself to find
(08:29):
out what you had to offer, and so then he
smiled and then he said, well, this is what I need,
and he said something that I now call a buzzword
because they were words that I had used in the
story that I wrote about myself. And at that moment,
I said, I'm going to get this job because I
(08:52):
could just talk about it extemporaneously with no problem. We
talked for an hour and a half and I ended
up getting the job. So it was great.
Speaker 1 (09:00):
What is amazing, insanely amazing and wonderful. Law Oh my god.
Speaker 2 (09:08):
So I tell everybody that because it's like we all
have a story, write our story and be able to
talk about it easily.
Speaker 1 (09:16):
Exactly, and that does make it more conversational. I'm not
gonna lie. I just thought about it while you were
sitting here, and I was like, I need to do
that so I could be like, you know, flexible in
what I'm doing and saying, and not just like let
me list my accomplishment exactly exactly.
Speaker 2 (09:28):
You can say how you write about how this related
to this, and I learned this, and you can see
that all the skills that you have are transferable, and
so you know, my my journalism skills definitely helped me
in being a public relations practitioner, in community relations, and
(09:50):
definitely in writing my book.
Speaker 1 (09:52):
So this brings me to the subject that the ah
tongue get ready? Okay, sorry, So this brings me to
the question I have to ask all my guests, what
are the three top pieces of advice you would give
someone who's going to write a debut novel.
Speaker 2 (10:08):
Hmmm, that is a good that's a good question. You know.
I would say, you know, have a clear idea of
what you want to write about, and make sure you
know why you are writing about it and what impact
(10:28):
it will have, because you know, I can sit down
and write everything that's happened in my life, but how
does how does it impact the reader? I wrote my
book because people didn't know about the link between birth
control pills over the age of forty and blood clots
(10:49):
that caused stroke, and so because too many people didn't
know about it, I wanted to write about my story
and tell them about that. So you know, have a
clear idea of why you want to write the story. Secondly,
I would say trust the process and the timing, because
(11:10):
so many times, authors, including myself, have a timeline which
a timeline is good. I'm not saying don't have a timeline,
but we can say I want to have this done
by this and this done by this date, and this
done by this date. I want to publish at this time.
And that's an outline, right, that's an outline for your book.
(11:34):
But as you know, you know, things change. I remember
that I was sending out to beta readers and thinking, Okay,
I'm going to get it back at this time and
launch by this date. And when I got my beta
readers to return their information, they had some questions for me,
(11:55):
and it made me have to write two additional chapters.
And I didn't feel like it at first because I
hadn't thought about that, and so it took me a
month to even start writing those two chapters. But because
I had to do that, and it, of course it
delayed everything, but it made the book much better. And
so trust the timing and then just realize that your
(12:19):
story matters to somebody. It could be somebody who had
another stroke.
Speaker 1 (12:26):
Who you know.
Speaker 2 (12:27):
But your audience may not be my audience. Somebody You're
writing your book for somebody, And just realize that your
audience is out there, and think about who that audience
might be.
Speaker 1 (12:42):
Thank you, thank you for that, because you think about
how many books already on the subject, and everyone was like, oh,
bring something new. You know what's you.
Speaker 2 (12:49):
Exactly, absolutely absolutely.
Speaker 1 (12:53):
And you're gonna have you want to see it completely
different from somebody else. The Oh my goodness. I just
want to say the first, can you do recognize that
when they give you birth control pills, they do tell
you that there is a chance of stroke, even before
forty there's a chance of people who have issues with
their heart they cannot take birth control. Yeah, it's a
chance of people with blood vegetab issues they cannot take
(13:14):
birth control. It does a number on the.
Speaker 2 (13:16):
Body, it does. But when I tell you, but if
you need them, please take them right when I tell
you though that because I, you know, was first of all,
the doctor said I was relatively young to have a stroke,
and of course that's relative, and I did not think
(13:37):
I had history of stroke in my family. I was
relatively active, I had never really had a health issue,
so people were surprised that I had a stroke. And
so of course once I survived and got back to work,
everybody says, what caused it? What caused it? And I
tell them that. And when I say, half the women said,
(13:57):
oh yeah, my doctor told me that in my mid
thirties and took me off birth control pills and said
I was too young to have a stroke. But the
other half were like me, and they looked at me
wide eyed and said, what, I'm over forty and still
taking birth control pills. And I didn't know that. So
because there was such a wide disparity, I was like, Okay,
(14:21):
I need to tell my story. And you know I
should have known that, you know, because you know it's
in the fine print. But I was like, who, Like,
I didn't read the fine print. I had been on
it before, and somehow that got kind of lost in
the shuffle. So and apparently it got lost in the
shuffle for others because people are still reading my book
(14:44):
and saying the same thing and thanking me and saying
now they're having conversations with their doctors. So so I'm
glad I followed God's lead and wrote the book.
Speaker 1 (14:57):
Most people, I don't think most people pay attention to it,
but like, yeah, I'm going to brag about myself. You know,
I've been studying medicine often only since I was five
years old. MM hmm, you heard me, right, I said, fine,
And so like I'm always worried about heart health and strokes,
that that's yeah thing. And then I'm gonna share a
(15:18):
little bit about myself. I do have heart issues. I
always had them. Always worried about birth control, heart health, stroke,
blood clots. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (15:29):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (15:29):
And the reason I knew about it. I would tell
other people about it. But you know, like at that time,
I was twenty some years old, and they're like, yeah,
I'm not dying. I mean, come on, we're in our twenties.
We're like in distructions.
Speaker 2 (15:39):
We think we're invincible, right, and if we don't have
somebody in our family that has you know, has that
issue there, you know, if there's not a reason for
us to really pay attention to the doctor, we're just like, oh,
i need birth control fiells and so I'm going to
take them. And you're not thinking about it, especially if
nothing has ever happened to you it, so you're not
(16:01):
thinking about that when you are just you haven't had
a health issue. So that's why I said I needed
to write the book, because there were too many of
us who you know, did not know it and did
not pay attention. Maybe the doctors didn't say it, and
I don't, like, yeah, I don't.
Speaker 1 (16:18):
I actually the end, it's on the end of the
birth control commercials on television. M h, it's definitely on
the end. I was like, no, right, I mean, I
mean you could, like, you could definitely look for a
different kind and different style, and you know, there's so
much going on that you could look for. But I
(16:39):
don't know where I'm having an issue. I'm having a
chit chat about birth control. Well, that's the right, I mean, obviously,
it's because it goes with the book.
Speaker 2 (16:48):
Yep, it goes with the book. And and the thing is,
you know, not everybody reads the fine print. Not everybody
you know, you know has had an issue or known
about somebody, so you know there, that's why, that's why
this information is out here. And you know, people get
information in different ways. And so if the doctor didn't
(17:13):
say anything, and your friends haven't said anything, or your
mom hasn't said anything, you know, I hope my book
lets you know, Okay, this is something you need to
pay attention to because I think there are a lot
of women out there just like me, you know, single,
not even you know, concerned about certain things, and this
(17:33):
is this is for them.
Speaker 1 (17:35):
I want to thank you, firs someone for sharing this
bit of information and like in a way that you
can take it in as a narrative, not that someone
being like and I'm telling you you know right, we
can take the narrative. Remember that we can survive this.
You know the signs, get help, Know that you can
get back to life.
Speaker 2 (17:55):
Absolutely absolutely, because people today, you know, who meet me
and don't know my story, when they find out that
I have a struck, had a stroke, they are shocked.
Like yesterday, my condo association had a little gathering and
my mom and I went and somehow my book came
(18:17):
up and people were like, what, you had a stroke.
It doesn't seem that way, and I was like, well
it happened, so you know, I'm just like I said before,
grateful to God that he spared me and spared my life.
And I think he did it so that I could
share this information because there were so many people who
(18:38):
didn't realize, like I said, the link between birth control
pills and blood clots and strokes.
Speaker 1 (18:44):
It's very important to know. I mean it's important to know.
I think all of our meds, but all of the
side effects for all the meds. There's just so many lists,
you knowation I think there.
Speaker 2 (18:58):
I think there are more commercials on medication today than
I remember, or either if they were out there before,
I wasn't necessarily listening to them, you know what I mean,
Because once I had to take warfaring, I heard all
the commercials about warfaring and and similar medication, and I'm like, oh,
(19:23):
I never heard that before. You know, It's kind of
like when you get a new car and you haven't
seen that car before, but as soon as you get one,
you see every car like yours on the highway. I
think it's the same way with you know, when you
when you've had a health issue, you start to listen
to different things in a different.
Speaker 1 (19:40):
Way exactly exactly you do. So now let's get back
to like the actual ways of writing this. So when
you sat down the writer, how did you organize the story?
Speaker 2 (19:52):
So I, you know, I first talked about well, first
of all, I I wrote the first chapter, which is a
short chapter because it is from my perspective on that day.
And of course that day I get up, I rushed
(20:16):
to this girl Scout's breakfast, and then I collapse, and
so it's probably like a page and a half, right,
or maybe two and a half pages or something like that.
And after I wrote that, I said to myself, oh, well,
I don't know what happened next, because I was in
neurological I see you for ten days and in the
hospital for a total of thirty two days, so I
(20:38):
was really out of it for a ten of those days,
and so I need to know what happened. And that's
when my journalistic skills came into play, because I said, okay,
I need to interview the people that were around me
and that helped me recover. And so I listed about
(20:58):
eleven people, I think, and I started interviewing them and
it was interesting because then they started telling me about
other people that did something that I had no idea.
And then so I ended up interviewing twenty two people,
(21:18):
which who had stories about what happened. And I remember
calling this one friend and I said, I hear that
you were instrumental in getting something getting somebody to the
hospital for me, and she and I want to talk
to you about it, and she said I was waiting
(21:41):
for your call. Now. I didn't even start to write
this book until five years after right, so I was
interviewing her. She had waited for five years for me
to call and say, I want to know about this,
and so, you know, it was just that kind an
organic process. So I interviewed people, I logged, you know,
(22:06):
I felt like I was back at the television station.
I interviewed everybody. I listened to their interviews. I logged
their interviews. And as I you know, listened and logged,
then I was able to really fill in the gaps
for everything. So you know, what one person remembered, then
(22:26):
the other person kind of remembered it in a different way.
But I could really fill in the gaps, and it
really gave me the sense of what happened on that
day and the ten days after that that I that I,
you know, had lost because I was in neurological ICU.
So so it was really very cathartic to really learn
(22:49):
what happened. And I think, you know, as a journalist,
you're always seeking the truth because everybody says, did that
traumatize you? And it didn't, because like I'm still a journalist,
you know, whether I work at a television station or not.
Journalism was my first love and so I think God
revealed to me that, you know what I want to
(23:12):
know about what happened, and it was at a time
when my heart and my mind could handle it. So
I was very very grateful that my friends were willing
to help me tell this story.
Speaker 1 (23:27):
That's an amazing way to do this. Now I'm sorry,
I should be called I should be wrapping up the
interview right now. That is what I should be doing.
So there is no clock, you know, running down my segment.
I'm not going to do it.
Speaker 2 (23:43):
Okay, I'm here for.
Speaker 1 (23:46):
A mid afternoon show, like a lifestyle show. Yeah, what
was that like to have that? And then a second question,
which is very important right now? What was it light
to have it? And the second question is how did
you pick your guest? Because you know, every author wants
(24:07):
to get on TV for their book, so we need
to know that information that's true.
Speaker 2 (24:11):
And so you know, this was before you know, of course,
this was way before I was an author. But I
had this idea, you know, to do segments in the
midday show, and so I pitched them because you know,
(24:31):
I was I was a co anchor, and so you know,
they were looking for ideas and I said, I would
like to have, you know, a show, a segment called
so it was really a segment within our midday show
and it also aired in the morning show, and it
was called Vivsview. And I just pitched things that I
wanted to do. So I'm a foodie and I love
(24:53):
restaurants and great food, and so on Monday, Vivsview did
lunch and so we would highlight you know, local restaurants,
new ones, staples. It was really great and so every
like all my friends when I left television, they were like, well,
how are we going to get great tables at the restaurants?
(25:15):
And I was like, is that all you care about?
But it was really fun. We did Vivsview did lunch Tuesday.
What did I do on Tuesday? I can't remember what
Tuesday was, but one day was travel. Thursday was travel
Thursday because I love to travel as well, and so
(25:36):
I have traveled all over the world and continue to travel.
In fact, I just got back from from Brazil in
late April and early May, and so you know, but
I've been to Africa, I've been to So, I've been
to I've been to all. I've been to all but
one of the continents and so that's my My last
goal is to at least get to UH Antarctica. So
(26:00):
so that's one thing. So Thursday was travel Thursday, and
and I just would I remember we went to Quito, Ecuador,
and so I wrote that trip off because I ended
up doing a story on keyto Ecuador, and so I
was like that worked.
Speaker 1 (26:16):
Out well, was a cool place to travel.
Speaker 2 (26:19):
It was really fun. I had the best payea there,
Oh my gosh, it was so good. And then I
would do when when there were different celebrities coming into town,
I would do like a celebrity show. So you know,
I interviewed DL Hughlely, I did you know, a segment
(26:41):
on UH during Mother's Day. One week, I did celebrity
moms that were connected to Milwaukee. So I ended up
at the time Eric Benet's mother, Eric Bana, is from Milwaukee,
and so I interviewed his mom and you know others
as well. So it was really fun. And then you know,
I just decided to do whatever I wanted to do,
(27:05):
so whatever I was interested in, and because I had
had such seniority at the station, they were like, okay,
go with it. That's a great idea. And so it
was really very fun. It was like towards my latter
years at Channel four, but it was like super super fun.
Speaker 1 (27:22):
Oh my goodness, that sounds absolutely amazing. Now, do you
have any hints or any suggestions on how authors can
make themselves presentable to morning shows or mid afternoon lifestyle shows.
Speaker 2 (27:34):
Absolutely, so when I you know, I'll tell you this.
So when I launched my book, when the words suddenly
stopped finding my stroke again, I mean finding my voice
again after a massive stroke, you know, I really looked
at Okay, the first time I launched, you know, just
I launched it in It was in March. In fact,
(27:56):
it launched March twenty fourth twenty which, if you remember,
was the first week of the shutdown because of COVID.
So I had to cancel all of my appearances. So
I had to launch online. But I was just like like, okay,
(28:18):
what am I gonna do? So I launched online, but
I did a news release, you know, to say that,
you know, former television journalist loses her voice, YadA, YadA, YadA.
So then because I had to you know, that was
the first that was the first time, you know, my launch.
But then May was coming up, so that gave me
(28:41):
an opportunity to say, you know, May is Stroke Awareness Month.
So I relaunched the idea in May for Stroke Awareness
Month and was able to, you know, get on Good
Morning America, which was amazing. And so what I would
say is, you know you're gonna get you know, you're
(29:03):
gonna get probably more nose than yes is. But once
you get a yes, you like milk that for all
you can. Right, because I had that segment I posted
on on my social media, on my website, you know,
I can now say as seen on Good Morning America.
So you can do all those things, and you just
(29:28):
gotta kind of leverage that calendar, like, you know, whatever
your topic is. You know, if you're writing about domestic violence,
there's a month for domestic Violence Awareness month. You know what,
you know, look and see what what naturally will come
to you as far as you know what your topic is,
and so you can usually leverage that. And then you know,
(29:51):
if you're the first in your you know, sometimes people
just launch at home, right, you know, your hometown publications
or radio stations or television stations. They have segments and
so it's like give them an idea of what your
book is. But you've got to have a hook, so
try to find a hook that kind of gets somebody's attention.
Speaker 1 (30:16):
Thank you so much for that information. I really really
appreciate that. I'm sorry. I love hearing about how to
get on television because it's long as things to do. Yeah,
I fairly enjoy it. In case you yet, nah, I
think I'm bragging about myself this entire time.
Speaker 2 (30:34):
We got our own horn. Some authors don't want to
do that, and so, oh, that's never been my problem
in tell but you know, I'm sure you know many
authors who are like, I don't know, and uh, you know,
if you're not gonna toot your own horn, then other
people are not gonna want to you know, they're not
(30:55):
going to know about you.
Speaker 1 (30:57):
Just just look up there, you go, right about there,
I have a whole magazine with me in it, and
then over this side there's a magazine with me in it,
and then on that side there was supposed to be
another one, but I haven't put it up yet. I
feel like I'm doing a lot of touting just right
there in the background.
Speaker 2 (31:12):
Idea.
Speaker 1 (31:15):
Absolutely so, can you tell us where we can find
out more about you and about the book?
Speaker 2 (31:21):
Absolutely? You can visit my website at Vivianlking dot com.
Of course, that has links to me on Amazon and
Barnes and Noble, and you can find me on LinkedIn
and it also my homepage at the bottom of it.
It connects to all of my social media, so you
can connect with me there and uh and yeah, Vivianlking
(31:45):
dot com you can find everything out about me that
you want. Awesome.
Speaker 1 (31:51):
I am loving this. Thank you so much. Everyone, Please
go to Vivianlking dot com. Not only does she have
a book about stroke, she has a book about for
children as well. Can you can we see that book? Real?
Speaker 2 (32:00):
Absolutely? I like you never asked, so here it is.
This is my first children's book. It's called Grace Welcomes
the Lady next Door Book one and the Growing Up
Polite series. And I just have a pet peeve about
rude people. And you know that this country has devolved
(32:22):
into a very rude country. I mean, I don't even
really want to go into all of it, but you know,
when you have adults behaving badly, you know they are
behaving in ways that we would not teach our kids
to do. And so I thought we needed to go
back to the basics. And there are several kids who
(32:45):
may not have grown up in a family like mine,
where my mom and my grandmother, you know, they made
sure that I said please and thank you and treated
people and the way that I wanted to be treated.
But if you don't have people teaching you that at home,
you know, and for whatever reason, I wanted to give
(33:08):
those students something to read and learn about manners the
way that I did. So if they didn't learn about
it at home, they can learn about it in my book.
And when I read to children, it is so wonderful,
like they give me life. They give me life because
they pick out the themes so easily, and you know,
(33:29):
they pick out things that you know, I didn't you know,
even sometimes think about. But you know, my story, you know,
teaches about manners. But it's also Grace welcomes the lady
next door. It's also about moving to a new place
and being a new person in a city, and and
you know, just it talks about grief because Grace has
lost her mom. Her mom passed away and so that's
(33:52):
why they moved and and so it's it just really
talks about a lot lot of different things. And I
love the lessons. And so this is book one and
book two I've already written. I'm waiting for the illustrator
to send the drawings and illustrations, and hopefully it will
(34:12):
be out later this year. And it's grace and the
thank you note so oh my goodness, oh.
Speaker 1 (34:19):
And the thank you notes. That is an art that
is practically dead.
Speaker 2 (34:22):
Absolutely, But you know, just think if you're somebody who
who sends a handwritten thank you note or even just
to to you know, send a thank you note at all? Right,
people are that that is a lost art.
Speaker 1 (34:38):
It truly, truly is. I mean, we are the ladies.
So therefore we have stacks of about a thousand and
some thank you notes because we do have to send
that a.
Speaker 2 (34:45):
Lot lowly you do, and I need to write about you, guys.
I've never I'll be looking. I'll be looking when I'm
with you.
Speaker 1 (35:01):
Oh, I don't know if we'll have lady like behavior.
There's a bar.
Speaker 2 (35:07):
You can still you can.
Speaker 1 (35:09):
It was like I know everyone has said, you're always
a lovely lady who knows how to handle her bourbon exactly.
Speaker 2 (35:15):
See thank you kindly.
Speaker 1 (35:19):
One more time? Tell us the website before I wrap
it up for us over here.
Speaker 2 (35:23):
The website is Vivianlking dot com and I would welcome
you coming to visit and sending me a note in
the chat, So that would be great.
Speaker 1 (35:32):
Awesome, Okay, you guys, I'm well known on one half
of the at I thought ladies, you can find out
everything that your ladies are doing at www dot and
I thought ladies dot com. While you're there, take a
moment and go down to the bottom of the page
and see the charities that we probably support. It doesn't
mean that you have to give them money in order
to support them. We asked that you support them as well. Again,
(35:52):
not money. It could be time, or it could be information.
Because we found out one one place needed help with
grants and turns out we knew someone and they were like,
I can help with that, and I was like, hey,
look at that. It's not money, it's just knowledge. So hey,
if you can't do that, then you know money always works.
We thank you in advance for supporting them. Remember that
wisdom is all around you if you're open to finding
(36:12):
it and accepting it. So peace and love you guys
from Wilnona and the Missing Jade. Oh yeah, thanks for listening.
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