I have been a member of the South Bay Writers Club for a few years now. When I joined, I had just started my first draft of a book I was writing based on my experiences working for attorneys. I had been thinking of writing on this topic for years, because I never had a shortage of stories to tell. The South Bay Writers Club helped to encourage me with my writing due to the inspirational speakers at our monthly meetings.

The first few pages of my book were written on napkins during my lunch breaks at work. Then, I went out and bought myself a notebook and wrote in my notebook during lunch and after work, and sometimes in the early mornings. I had a friend with terminal cancer and I wrote at the hospice during my weekly visits. He was sad that he would never see the finalization of my book, but he was amazed how quickly I wrote. During the weekends I would type up my text onto my old computer and back it up on discs. One notebook turned into about four notebooks and my first draft was over 500 pages long. My first draft took a total of eight months of writing.

I spent another three months cleaning up the draft and gave it to an attorney and a layperson to read. At first both parties were nervous to give me their opinions. Writers are sensitive about their hard work and my readers weren't sure how I was going to react to their well intended comments. However, after seeing that I was receptive, and asked specific questions, these initial readers provided wonderfully constructive criticism. I went back and revised my text again based on some of their important comments, while I searched for a professional editor for more feedback.

After interviewing many referrals that I received from our club, I finally paid a published novelist to read and critique my book. Again more comments, and suggestions were made, and afterwards, I worked on another revision. I went to a writers' conference in San Diego, and paid a New York book editor to read some chapters of my book. More helpful comments lead to more revisions.

After trying to get my book recognized by an agent or small publishing company and having no luck, I revised it again another two times, and then sent it to Xlibris for self-publishing. They did some line editing which I reviewed and again made more changes. There were more copy editing by myself and by a co-worker who had volunteered to help me as well. Her fresh eyes were a major contribution towards the finalization of my book.

My title went through a few changes throughout the past few years and I finally settled on "The Accidental Secretary." I thought about how it was just an accident that I ended up working in the legal field in my early twenties, fresh out of college.