Hello! Allow me to introduce myself!

First of all let me introduce myself. I am Amanda Kerns. I am from a small town called Urbana, Ohio. It is a very pretty small town close enough to Dayton and Columbus to afford great shopping opportunities and great medical care if ever needed but far enough out in the middle of nowhere to be considered rural.

I was born and raised in Urbana, and have lived there most of my life. In 1985 I graduated from Urbana High School then went into the United States Marine Corps. My primary MOS in the Marines was Communications Center Operator. While in the Marines I did get to see a tiny little bit of the world. Japan, Korea, and Puerto Rico and several places in the USA.

After my enlistment ended I returned to Urbana and went to work. My first job out of the Marines was as a waitress. I will be woman enough to admit that I am an awful waitress! I tried very hard, but I get sidetracked too easily. And, I honestly do not have the patience required to do the job well. I mean, come on, so there's a tomato in your salad. Pick it out if you don't like them! LOL!

Anyway, I ended up as a manager in a pizza restaurant and did that for a long time. During that time, I became a volunteer Firefighter/EMT and dispatcher at the North Lewisburg fire department. And I am very proud of that. I loved that job! What a way to serve the people of your community!

In 2004, I moved to Florida. For a stupid reason, which I'm sure will eventually make it into a book in the future! I lived in a small town in central Florida called Crescent City. I worked at Burger King for two and a half years then went to work at Winn Dixie. Boy, let me tell you, people in Florida are certainly a lot different than people in Urbana! But I did meet some wonderful friends there and will always keep them close in my heart!

In 2014, I moved back to Ohio. It's a long story, and yes, eventually that will become part of another story at some point in the near future!

So, here I am, in 2015, with a beautiful published book. And inside that beautiful book, is a wonderful, emotion evoking, heart wrenching story. Everyone always asks me how I did it. So, here goes.....

I have always enjoyed writing. As a child, about 9 or 10 years of age, I would write little plays and make my brother and sister, friends, and cousins play them out. My favorite memory of those little plays was the one about farm animals against littering. Keep in mind, I was only about 10 at the time.

As I got older I started writing poems. They weren't very good. But, I wasn't good at expressing my feelings so they gave me a way to express myself without having to expose my feelings to anyone else. When I turned 14, my cousin Mike gave my REO Speedwagon's album Hi Infidelity for Christmas and I was hooked! Then I started trying to write song lyrics. Granted, my sheltered, and extremely limited social life didn't feed much inspiration for songs! But, I was only 14 at the time.

All through high school I continued writing poems and “song lyrics” but I never once let anyone ever read them. I was way too insecure to let anyone even know that I enjoyed writing! After high school, I of course went into the Marines. I didn't do very much writing during that time. But I sure did a lot of growing up and living! I do miss the 1980's!

After the Marines, I did start writing again. Just poems though. I don't know that any of them were any good. I don't even have any of them anymore. But, I started learning to write when I was feeling something strongly. Before, I'd write about something I was feeling. But, now I started writing what I was feeling and how I was feeling.

At some point in the early 1990's I ventured into short stories. I really enjoyed that kind of writing. I could let my wild imagination run wild! And wild did it run!

Then I hit a brick wall. In 2001, my depression got so bad that I was seriously considering taking my life. In January of that year I was writing a good-bye letter to my mother. I had it all planned out. But, as I was writing the letter, something spoke to me, (I firmly believe it was the Holy Spirit) it told me to talk to my doctor. I had an appointment the next day. I sat there and cried for a long time. Then I said out loud, “Okay, I'll talk to him. Maybe it can help. I can't keep feeling like his.” And that is what I did. Thankfully! Unfortunately, one side effect of the anti-depressant medicine was a complete numbing of every emotion I could ever feel. For twelve years I walked around in a numbed state. I didn't feel anything. No joy, no sadness, no nothing! But, the medicine did help my brain to use the serotonin properly. Anyway, my writing completely stopped. I wasn't feeling anything at all to write. I'd try. But, I'd sit with a pen and paper and stare at the blank sheet with no idea's at all coming to mind.

Then in 2013, with my doctor's help, I was weened off the medicines VERY slowly. And a few months after I took my last pill, I picked up a pen and notebook again and started writing again. I started a couple of short stories but just recently finished one of them. An idea for a story started floating around in my head. It was a story different from any idea I had ever had before. I let it bounce around up there for a few months. Then one day, I sat down with a pen and a new composition book and wrote, “Look Daddy!” Those are the first two words of my story “Little Girl” and it grew very quickly from there.

From the day I wrote the first two words to the date it was published, it was just short of 18 months. As I started writing the story, I really didn't have a guide, or any plans at all. I just sat and wrote. While I was working, I'd think about what would happen next. Then I'd ride my bicycle home the 6 ½ miles as fast as I could so I could get back to writing. After the original draft was finished I started reading my new story. Up until that point, I had not even thought of publishing.

As I read my story, something told me this was going to be a powerful story. But, I also new I wanted to make some changes to the story. Even my untrained eye spotted several holes in the story and I wanted to elaborate on the characters more. Add more depth. Then one day, as I was searching something on the internet, out of the blue, an ad for publishing popped up on my google page. And the seed was sown.

A few weeks later, after the seed was sown, I thought to myself, This story needs to be told. So I started researching the publishing process. Talk about intimidated! I said, No way! There's no way I could get something I've written published! So I continued working on my story just for my own entertainment. Then one day, another publishing add popped up for another publisher. Page Publishing. I thought, Oh what the heck, I'll click on the link for the free info. About a week later I received the info in the mail and I received a call from Nick at Page Publishing. We talked a few minutes and I explained to him that I had no idea if I was really interested in publishing or not. I also explained that the story was far from ready to be read by anyone other than me, and that I was sorry for wasting his time. He was very nice and told me that if I ever decided to publish to give him a call and he'd be more than happy to help if he could.

About two months later, I had been working diligently on my story. I had re-written it and it was a lot better. Nick called me again and asked how my story was coming along. He asked about the story and the characters and what the story was about. At the end of the call he told me again to call him if I decided to publish.

I continued to work on the story and a month later, Nick called again. I told him that I had finally gotten the story to where I was happy with it, and that I enjoyed reading it. He said that it sounded like a very interesting story and that he wanted to encourage me to submit it to be read by their people. I was hesitant. But, by the end of the call, I was seriously thinking about it.

Another month passed and I received another call from Nick. He was very supportive with his comments and sounded very interested in my story. Of course, I know that is his job, and he probably had several people he was telling the same thing too. But he was very nice. At the end of that call he said, “Good luck with what ever you decide to do with your story. I do enjoy speaking with you and hearing about Little Girl.”

About a week later, I had a brave day and decided, what the heck. The submission was free, so I had nothing to lose. I figured that this would do away with any idea's I may have about publishing. I figured they'd read it and get a good laugh and turn it down. Besides, Stphen King was rejected like twelve or thirteen times before his first book was picked up by a publisher! And I knew I was nowhere near the writer he is! And to this day I still realize that! I know I am no Stephen King!

So, I submitted it. First to Page Publishing because of the encouragement I received from Nick. Then I submitted it to six other publishers. Each one said that I should hear back within a week to ten days. The first one I heard back from was Nick. I was out jogging and when my phone buzzed I looked down and saw that it was Page Publishing so I answered the call.

Nick just burst out saying, “They loved your story Amanda! They are still talking about it! They want to publish your story!”

My head started spinning! I was so excited! He encouraged me to talk to a lawyer before I made any decisions at all about publishing. He quickly sent me an email with the basic publishing contract so I could show it to a lawyer.

Then, over the next few days, I heard back from the rest of the publishers and they all were excited about the story! So, I did some research on each of the publishers and talked to a lawyer. And the rest is history! Seven months later, I held in my hands, my very first published book. With an awesomely beautiful cover, thanks to Page Publishing and their wonderful art department! I cried when I first saw the cover! And I cried again when I held the book in my hands. All of the writing, tears, editing, reading, rereading, rewriting, re-editing, had come to fruition! I was so proud!

Little Girl is about a girl who suffers abuse from multiple people in her life. This story tells her story and how it affects her life and some of the effects of the abuse. It is a moving tale about a girl and her relationship with her father and how that one relationship can affect every relationship she has. I hope to use this book to help me speak out against abuse, bullying, rape and depression. And I hope you will enjoy reading Little Girl and will feel every emotion I felt as I wrote the story.

Enjoy and God bless!