Classic City Vibes
Classic City Vibes Podcast - Conversations with people in the Athens, Oconee and surrounding communities who help make this such an amazing place to live. Learn what is going on in one of the nation’s most famous music, film and art scenes, learn about some of the amazing opportunities around us where you can be active and interact with others who have similar interests. This podcast is put out by the Athens Regional Library System where we are committed to helping build strong communities and celebrating our diversity. Engaging Communities, Exceeding Expectations.
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Classic City Vibes
Author and Equestrian Kendra Collier
Kendra Collier shares her journey from horseback riding enthusiast to published children's book author. Her book "Amber's Equestrian Alphabet" began as a high school senior project but quickly became a passion project combining her love for animals with new writing skills.
• First fell in love with horses during a trail ride in Tennessee just three years ago
• Competes in show jumping and earned second place in her first competition
• Created "Amber's Equestrian Alphabet" to teach children the ABCs through horse-themed content
• Published through Kindle Direct Publishing with both print and e-book versions available on Amazon
• Designed book with rhyming text and horse jokes to keep children engaged
• Planning to study wildlife biology in college and hopes to work in animal conservation
• Dreams of owning her own farm with horses and creating personal riding trails
• Book launch event scheduled for March 29th from 11am-2pm at the Oconee Library
Visit www.aeabookseries.com for more information or email info@aeabookseries.com to connect with Kendra.
Welcome to Classic City Vibes. Today we have Kendra Collier, author of Amber's Equestrian Alphabet, beginner's Guide to the ABCs of Horses. Thanks for coming in today.
Speaker 2:Kendra, thank you so much for having me. I really appreciate it.
Speaker 1:So when did you first get started writing?
Speaker 2:So, because I had a senior project at my school, I really had to start thinking about what I wanted to do back in like October. But I didn't really start the writing process until like January and that was when, like I started figuring out my storyline and then like how to figure out how to publish it and things like that.
Speaker 1:So this started as a senior project.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so at my school we have to have well as seniors. Every single senior has to have a project about something that they're passionate about. So for me, I'm very passionate about animals and horses, and so I just kind of wanted to do something in that kind of range. So I just wanted to write a children's book and just share my love for animals and horses through my book.
Speaker 1:So you weren't really necessarily a writer before that.
Speaker 2:No, I wasn't Okay.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so your first love is horses.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:And then this is kind of coming off from that. So when did you get in? How long have you been riding horses?
Speaker 2:I've only been riding horses for about like three years or so yeah, so it was very recent, but like I've always loved animals ever since I was a child, like I grew up always going to zoos and like nature centers and things like that.
Speaker 1:So I've always loved animals. Yeah, and what made you decide?
Speaker 2:to start horses. It's actually really funny because we went on a trail ride in Tennessee and I mean I just instantly fell in love with horses. It was funny because my mom she was really she was really terrified. She did not. She did not like horses at all. She was terrified the entire time.
Speaker 2:I did it because you wanted me there I was trying to support you and I was like whatever, yeah, but I mean I loved every second of it and I hated that I had to get off. But ever since then I just kept begging my mom day after day to let me continue riding horses, and that's kind of how that began.
Speaker 1:She's like as long as I don't have to ride with you, yeah.
Speaker 2:I think I probably should have started off small, I think. When we were in the hills and seeing a little drop off cliffs and all of that, I was like, okay, if this horse reels up, I'm in trouble.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, I should have just stayed in a little small arena. Well, my youngest one will not get on it Like they got on a horse. One time the horse did not even move and they were like uh-uh, I'm out, I'm out. This is too high, that's too low. I don't trust it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it was a big adjustment. When I first got on the horse I was like, oh, this is really high up, but it was just really fun.
Speaker 1:So you want to continue working with horses?
Speaker 2:Yes, my ultimate dream is to have like a cute little farm and have like a few horses and just ride around. I hope to have like a whole bunch of land and kind of have my own trail ride like my own trail to ride my horses, and I mean I just love animals. So I want to have like a little farm with like pigs, goats, things like that. I don't, I'm going to be so honest Mom's shaking her head. Yeah, I don't know where my love for animals came from, not mom, Not, yeah, definitely not A lot of my family.
Speaker 2:They just don't really fool with animals like I do. But I think it's because I grew up as an only child, so because I always went to zoos and things like that, it was just kind of like a kin relationship with me and animals and I just found comfort and family in animals so for you are horses, kind of the pentacle of kind of the animals at this point, or is it just like one of many animals, that you?
Speaker 2:love it's. Horses are my favorite animal ever ever since I started riding them, so yeah, so what does your riding look like?
Speaker 1:is that like? I'm going to show my ignorance here like the jumping stuff, or is it? Just like riding around, like, yeah, what's up?
Speaker 2:um, for me, I love show jumping, so, uh, the highest I've jumped was like two feet, but I'm hoping to get to like four feet or higher. But I don't know how that would make my mom feel. It gets to a point like I won't be jumping like six feet. Um, but yeah.
Speaker 1:I just, is that like competition? I?
Speaker 2:have. I have gone on a couple of competition, not as many as I would like, but I've been to a couple competitions and it's kind of crazy because my very first competition ever I actually got second place in one of the divisions that I competed in, so I was really proud of that.
Speaker 1:Oh, wow, yeah, that probably like, really even sparked it even more. Yeah, exactly Not only do I love it, I'm good at it Exactly yeah. All right, let's go back to the writing a little bit. So what was the writing process like for the book? Because it sounded like it wasn't really part of your life before the writing. What was that like for you?
Speaker 2:It was very difficult at first because, like I said, like I didn't write at all before, but I had to do a lot of research and after researching I discovered that the main takeaway was to figure out a way to keep the child's attention. So that's why, if you look through my book, it rhymes and then it also has like a section with horse jokes at the end, just to kind of like engage the child in my book and just make it a fun learning process now these horse jokes you made up yourself, or what?
Speaker 2:is it? No? No, I looked them up, yeah they're not like dad jokes how do you, when you're writing like a picture book? I?
Speaker 1:always thought it's like how do you when you're writing a picture book. I always thought it was like how do you know? I would think like one of the challenges, like how do I know I'm connecting at that level, because it's hard to remember what it's like as a five-year-old like reading and things like that.
Speaker 2:How did?
Speaker 1:you think about that during the process, like, am I going over the head or am I hitting on the mark?
Speaker 2:That's actually a really good question. On the mark, that's actually a really good question, I would say. I mean I kind of just like had an image in my head as I started the book. So, for example, the first page is A is for apple. So I just had like a picture of the horse in the stable and then like a bucket of apples on the side and like me feeding the horse and apples. So I mean I just kind of tried to make every page like what the actual letter was.
Speaker 1:Okay, and did you do the drawing? Is it pictures?
Speaker 2:No, I had to hire someone to draw. I found someone to hire because I wish I could draw like that, but I can't yeah.
Speaker 1:Plus, that would have been time consuming. Yeah, it would have been very time consuming and you got to do it senior year.
Speaker 2:Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 1:Did you get an A or were you still in that process?
Speaker 2:It's pass or fail, so I'm hoping I passed, but I didn't.
Speaker 1:I don't know yet When's the book actually coming out.
Speaker 2:So you can actually buy the book on Amazon right now. So it is actually out already, but I do have a book launch here at the O'Connor.
Speaker 1:Library on March 29th and it's from 11 to 2. Awesome, so people come check out the book, meet you, talk to you a little bit, talk, talk, riding, talk horses.
Speaker 2:Yeah, definitely.
Speaker 1:Or if you have a little. I would think if, if you love horses and you have a little kid, then you want to probably instill that in your kid, this would be a great like ABC book to get that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's that's really the main reason why I want to create a book, because I just kind of want to pour in my love for horses and animals into the children who read my book and maybe spark an interest in horses to the child who reads my book. Very nice.
Speaker 1:And you'll be at FanFest. So FanFest is the event we have at the Coney County Civic Center every year, and you'll be one of the vendors there. I will be so if people can't make it to the book launch, then come check you out at. Fanfest on April the 12th, 10 to 6 pm over at the Coney County Civic Center. What did you learn from writing the book?
Speaker 2:Something I learned from writing the book. I would say Writing's hard yeah writing's hard.
Speaker 2:It definitely was time consuming. Trying to figure out the storyline was time consuming trying to figure out the storyline. But I guess the biggest thing is to for me was to not procrastinate on it, because if I just kept pushing the days back and just like waiting till the last minute to do stuff, I never it never would have gotten done, because there's certain there's a certain timeline that I had to have in order to create the book and, like how I contacted people, you just had to be on top of it all the time. So I couldn't really procrastinate on it and if I did, the book would not have been published.
Speaker 1:So so here's a question for you. So as part of the, the senior project, you could have just written the book and not necessarily have it published, right? What made you decide to go ahead and go the publishing route instead of just you know, know, kind of like here's my example and get an A? What made you want to actually put it out into the world?
Speaker 2:It was mainly because I do want to continue publishing books in the future. So I just kind of want to make this like kind of just to get my foot in the door and just see how it would be to publish a book, so that I could continue publishing books later in the future.
Speaker 1:Do you want to keep working in kids books, adult books, teen books?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I do. I do think that I'm going to continue to write children's books just because I want to spark an interest in young children, and I feel like it's easier to do that with younger children than like older teenagers.
Speaker 1:I know the answer to this, but I'm going to ask you anyway. And all these books can have animals in them? All of them, yeah, which is perfect for kids' books, because 90% of kids' books have animals in them anyway. Yeah, it's kind of like an innate love, when you're a kid of animals. It's kind of interesting, and horses are definitely a big part of that. What's a book that you have enjoyed lately?
Speaker 2:A book that I've read recently is Shatter Me, and I really love that book because it kind of started off as a girl who wasn't very confident in herself and she just didn't really believe in herself and then she found out that she had awesome powers and she just became more confident in herself. So just as I read the book, it was just very it felt like I grew with her because she was growing more confident in her powers and in herself. So I don't know, it was just kind of empowering to read that book, because she was just very timid at first, very shy, and then throughout the book series she just became more bold and confident in herself and I just loved every moment of it.
Speaker 1:Did you feel that writing yourself, did that give you more confidence?
Speaker 2:writing I would. Yes, I would say that because at first kind of like what I was saying earlier, I didn't know how to write a book at all. But through the process of writing my book and publishing my book, I just felt more and more confident and I was like, wow, this is actually something that I can do. This is something I can continue to do in the future. So it just gave me a lot of confidence.
Speaker 1:Did you enjoy the actual writing process? Or was it more, just kind of like this is what I need to do to get to this and this is what I want, yeah.
Speaker 2:I would say that I did enjoy writing it. I feel like I do enjoy reading more than I enjoy writing, but I just it was pretty fun. So, yeah, I do enjoy reading more than I enjoy writing, but I just it was pretty fun.
Speaker 1:So yeah, and when you went through the publishing process, what was that like going, you know, after you finished writing the book, or what was that like for you?
Speaker 2:I feel like the hardest thing from the publishing process was to actually find a way to publish it. But I published it through Kindle Direct Publishing and once like, all I really had to do was just complete the steps on there and then it was available on Amazon, so I feel like that was pretty easy, nice.
Speaker 1:And do you have print copies as?
Speaker 2:well, so how does that?
Speaker 1:work with Kindle.
Speaker 2:I have paper book copies and I also have an e-book version online.
Speaker 1:And the horseback riding. What do you get from it that maybe you don't get from writing other things? What's unique about the experience of like being in a horseback riding?
Speaker 2:um, personal experience is just, I don't know. I just felt a connection more to animals as I was riding horses. It's just, it's not really something that you can do when you go visit a nature center and just like interact with the animals, but when you're on the back of a horse, it's just you kind of feel powerful because, like, you're controlling a thousand pound animal with your, with your body, and it's just, it's very empowering and it's just so fun.
Speaker 1:I love it, yeah, yeah what do you think maybe is some misconceptions people might have about horseback riding?
Speaker 2:I would definitely say. Online there's a ton of videos of things going wrong on horses, so like the horse falling or the rider getting seriously injured. But you just have to.
Speaker 2:You just have to you just have to remember that that's not every single time, that's not going to happen to everyone, and you just have to make sure that you're safe while you're riding horses so you're not doing things super dangerous, you're not riding without a helmet, because if you fall off a horse without riding a helmet and the horse steps on your head, it can get very dangerous. So, um, yeah, you just have to remember to be safe. Do things that you're comfortable with and not like take things over the edge and just remember to have fun, because the horse will pick up on your emotions. So if you're super tense and nervous, the horse will pick up on that and the horse will also be super tense and nervous.
Speaker 1:So, do you have your own horse?
Speaker 2:I don't. I really wish I did, but I don't know. But I hope to in the future.
Speaker 1:Ok, yeah, well there's a lot of goat, you know you have to have a stable and all the things. It's not like getting a dog.
Speaker 2:Right, right, a lot of money goes into it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, a little more complicated process. Yeah, so very cool, and what do you plan to do when you get out of high school? What's your plans?
Speaker 2:I plan to go to college to be a wildlife biologist, so I do want to pour into animals Also. Conservation, working on how to protect animals as well. Conservation, working on how to protect animals as well, and maybe in the future, work at a wildlife rehabilitation center or something like that.
Speaker 1:Very nice, where can?
Speaker 2:people find more information about you. Follow you all the good social media stuff. I do have a LinkedIn account so they can find me on there, and I also have a website called wwwaeabookseriescom and you can also email me at info at aeabookseriescom.
Speaker 1:Very cool. And one more time before we go what is the launch party?
Speaker 2:It is on March 29th from 11 to 2 at the Oconee Library.
Speaker 1:Very cool. Thank you for coming in today. Thank you, I hope everybody can make it out and check out your book.
Speaker 2:Thank you so much, thank you.