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During her lifetime she's been a missionary (who now writes romances), a wife (of one husband only), a mother (of three
now-adult people, who refuse to be called "children"), a musician (of piano, organ and accordian), a Tupperware saleswoman
(until the squirrels ate her sample kit), a teacher (of genealogy and creative writing), a translator (of Spanish, although
she knows enough of a few other languages to get her in trouble), a social worker (in the strict sense of the word, not just
being a "social creature"), a magazine writer (with over 2,000 published articles to her credit), a survivor (of the Great
Flood of the Millennium in Grand Forks, ND in 1997), and that is just for starters.
But, she is happiest if you call
her your favorite novelist! For it is writing that she really loves. With the publication of her first novel, which she admits
was an "overnight sensation"--after only 20+ years--she saw her dreams come true.
Little did she know that she would have to spend the next umpteen years not only writing more books, which thankfully
her "fans" demand from her, but letting the whole wide world know that they existed. And thus was born JES (Janet Elaine Smith,
in case you haven't figured that out yet), the marketer.
As fate, or God, or whatever you want to call it decreed,
she succeeded at that, too. Perhaps it is her insistent persistence, or maybe it's her fun attitude towards life in general,
or maybe it is just that she is so "simple-minded" (which several of her editors in her writing career have affectionately
accused her of being) that the things she tries actually work!
The one thing that she wasn't able to overcome was finding a publisher who could help her meet her literary goals. Oh
yes, four of them seemed like a very good thing, but a funny thing happened on the way to...well, who knows? At any rate,
they ended up in either bankruptcy, going incommunicado, or leaving her books in limbo.
But finally, friendship prevailed
over business sensibility (or maybe it is a combination of the two things), and Kristie Leigh Maguire, owner of Star Publish,
won the battle and all of JES's books are being re-released by Star Publish.
You know, of course, that everything
good in life comes with a price-tag. In the union of JES and KLM (that's Kristie, not the airline!), that price-tag was that
JES would agree to be the Marketing Director for Star Publish.
Is the cost too high? Not when you are having the time of your life! Whatever you do in life, make it fun, not work.
Then you don't mind when the alarm clock goes off before you are ready to get up. Just make sure you have the coffee brewing
(JES cannot live by bread alone; she has to have her timed coffee pot!) so you can get a jump on the day ahead.
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