Guest Post with Karey White ~ JeanBookNerd

Book Nerd Guest Post

Karey White grew up in Utah, Idaho, Oregon, and Missouri. She attended Ricks College and Brigham Young University. Her first novel, Gifted, was a Whitney Award Finalist.

She loves to travel, read, bake treats, and spend time with family and friends. She and her husband are the parents of four great children. She teaches summer creative writing courses to young people and is currently working on her next book.

Social Media

Website

The Greatest Thing I Learned in School

I know college is considered school, but for the purposes of this posting, I'm not including it. I liked college. Grades one through twelve, not so much.

School was hard for me. I was a shy child who preferred being at home with my family. Math and science completely escaped me and I spent years feeling slow and dumb. I think I asked my mom if I could stay home every day. I must have worn on her nerves terribly.

I learned many things during those years. I learned how to read. I learned the periodic table and how to diagram sentences. I memorized some Beowulf and some Shakespeare. I won a couple of spelling bees and learned how to say "one donkey" in Spanish. I learned that if I kept my eyes down and my pencil moving on my paper, the teacher would think I was taking notes and wouldn't call on me. I learned that if I swallowed and blinked hard, I could keep from crying when the popular girls talked about me and pointed at me. I learned that only dorks played with their little brothers during recess, therefore, I was a dork. I learned that I loved to read and read and read. I learned that I loved American History. I learned that if a girl throws up in class, it might make me throw up a little, too.I learned how to make a log cabin out of a milk carton and how to twist little pieces of crepe paper around the eraser of a pencil and then glue it to a picture to make it three-dimensional. I learned that some teachers screamed and some teachers were kind. I learned that I could carry a xylophone that weighed nearly as much as I did if leaned back really far so that my upper body and the xylophone were balanced. I learned how to stick with something until I was finished. Even if it was hard.

And that is probably the greatest thing I learned. I learned to finish what I started. Now, in my life as an author, finishing what I start is critical. It's what makes me sit down and write when I'd rather be reading, or watching something on television, or going shopping. It's what pushes me through the plot problems and the writer's block. It's what takes me from that first word to that 85,000th word. It's what takes an idea in my head to a book on the shelf in Barnes and Noble.

Twenty-four year-old, Abby Benson has dreams of owning her own wedding cake shop. An inheritance from her aunt gives her the ability to make those dreams come true. She hires Dane, a handsome contractor, to help her get the bakery up and running and soon they’re moving toward their own happy ending.

Unsure what to charge for her cakes, Abby has a crazy idea to let the customer decide what they think their cake is worth. This plan has its ups and downs, but the novelty of the idea makes her a local celebrity. When she is interviewed on television about the unusual idea, business booms and Abby has cake adventures she never dreamed possible. But as her fame grows, Abby is swept up in a whirlwind that threatens everything she values. With the challenges that face her, will she be able to determine what is worth the most?

You can purchase For What It's Worth at the following Retailers: