Six years at City College. Thirteen restaurant jobs. Calculus III three times. By 23, Joy Lane was lying in the grass, ready to walk away from her last final and everything she'd worked for.

In F College: A Memoir of Doubt, Self-Discovery, and Resilience, Joy goes back to that breaking point and walks readers through her final semester, building her story the way an engineer builds a system, with equilibrium, stress, and failure points.

In this episode of Author Hour, she joins Lex Statzer to talk about the classroom moment that convinced her to tell her story, what her ADHD diagnosis changed, why community college deserves more credit, and how a provocative title survived a team poll. She also shares her writing routine of two pages a day, why editing was harder than writing, and her advice for anyone afraid to start their own book: do it for yourself first.

For more information on Joy Lane, visit https://scribemedia.com/authors/joy-lane

For more information on F College, visit https://scribemedia.com/published-books/f-college

For 16 years, writing a book sat on Greg Hiebert's goals list. Deep down, he was afraid no one would read it, and if they did, they wouldn't like it. He finally confronted that fear, and the result was You Can't Give What You Don't Have, a book about the self-care leaders need before they can give love, patience, kindness, and insight to others.

In this episode of Author Hour, Greg joins Travis Stoliker to talk about how he got past the fear, why he fought to keep the book in his own voice, and how it became required reading in leadership programs years after launch. He also shares his journey through two bouts of prostate cancer and a Parkinson's diagnosis, the daily choice to "wallow or win," his positive point system, the seven habits at the heart of his book, and his candid advice for new authors: books do not sell themselves.

For more information on Greg Hiebert, visit https://scribemedia.com/authors/greg-hiebert

For more information on You Can't Give What You Don't Have, visit https://scribemedia.com/published-books/you-cant-give-what-you-dont-have-creating-the-seven-habits-that-make-a-remarkable-life

For more information on Changing Altitude, visit https://scribemedia.com/published-books/changing-altitude

What makes an experience extraordinary? Paul Zak has spent more than a decade answering that question in his lab, measuring what he calls the brain's "give a damn" signal and building a company, Immersion, that movie studios, theaters, educators, and brands now use on six continents.

In Immersion: The Science of the Extraordinary and the Source of Happiness, Paul turns that research into stories, from a tense encounter with an intelligence operator to helping Sony test movie trailers. In this episode of Author Hour, he joins Eric Jorgenson to talk about how a decade-long research program becomes a book, why every good nonfiction book is built like a sitcom, and how Immersion paid for itself in paid speaking engagements within its first month. He also shares why he chose more control over traditional publishing, how he uses AI as a "combative coauthor," why he still wants a human narrating his audiobooks, and his best advice for anyone thinking about writing a book.

For more information on Paul Zak, visit https://scribemedia.com/authors/paul-zak

For more information on Immersion, visit https://scribemedia.com/published-books/immersion

Getting a Black woman into the leadership seat is a milestone. Keeping her there, supported and thriving, is the real work. Dr. Monifa McKnight spent more than two decades rising from the classroom to the superintendent's office, and along the way she ran into challenges no preparation program had warned her about.

In Full Flight: Lessons in Leading as a Black Woman in Education, Dr. McKnight turns her own story, and the stories of pioneering Black women superintendents who came before her, into a roadmap for the next generation of leaders. In this episode of Author Hour, she joins Lex Statzer to talk about the intersection of identity, relationships, power, politics, transitions, and boundaries; why organizations can't celebrate women for breaking barriers and then leave them alone to survive; and why she believes leadership sustainability is the best business strategy. She also opens up about the emotional process of writing the book, the advice that changed how she works, and what she'd say to anyone carrying a story they haven't written yet.

For more information on Dr. Monifa McKnight, visit https://scribemedia.com/authors/monifa-mcknight

For more information on Full Flight, visit https://scribemedia.com/published-books/full-flight

Every day, roughly 10,000 baby boomer business owners hit retirement age, and most of them have no exit plan. The conventional wisdom says they have two choices: sell or shut it down. Richard Shaull, founder of Exit Without Selling, says there's a third.

In Exit Without Selling: Build a Dream Team, Keep Your Business, and Get Your Life Back, Richard lays out how owners can stop being the "chief everything officer" and build a team that runs the business without them.

In this episode of Author Hour, he joins Scribe CEO Travis Stoliker to talk about why so many owners regret selling, the two "egoic anchors" that keep founders stuck, why absentee ownership is mostly a fantasy, and how his clients go from 60-hour weeks to 10 to 20. He also shares how he uses the book as the front door to his consulting business, and his goal of getting 30,000 copies into the world through paid ads, Amazon, and free-book outreach.

On this episode of Author Hour, Matthew Ray Scott joins us to talk about Physician Brand Rx, the book he co-wrote with orthopedic surgeon Dr. Scott Sigmund. Drawing on his background as an Army psychological warfare officer, Matthew explains how patients make decisions under duress, why trust is a surgeon's currency and reputation is their bank account, and why most surgeons are not invisible, just not legible. He shares how an outline drafted on a napkin in a Bentonville pub became a book, why he and Dr. Sigmund chose a book even after building an award-winning podcast, and the Zoom interview method they used to write it in their own voices. Matthew also reflects on publishing his second book with Scribe, what the editorial team taught him about letting silence fill the page, and why imposter syndrome never really stops.

For more information on Matthew Ray Scott, visit https://scribemedia.com/authors/matthew-scott

For more information on Physician Brand Rx, visit https://scribemedia.com/published-books/physician-brand-rx

On this episode of Author Hour, gym owner and former schoolteacher Carrie Cox joins us to talk about her new book, The Self-Care Dare: 25 Habits for Lasting Wellness. What started as daily text messages to members of her Crew Fitness challenge grew into emails, blog posts, and finally a book built around five factors of wellness: mindset, nutrition, fitness, sleep, and connection. Carrie explains why going hard every day is the biggest misconception in fitness, why consistency matters more than choosing the perfect program, why strong connections may matter as much as diet and exercise, and how small, layered habits add up to lasting change. She also shares the writing advice she still follows from her high school speech teacher, why she insisted on writing in the first person plural, and her advice for anyone with a book inside them: just start.

For more information on Carrie Cox, visit https://scribemedia.com/authors/carrie-cox

For more information on The Self-Care Dare, visit https://scribemedia.com/published-books/the-self-care-dare

After more than 30 years leading stores for some of America's biggest brands, Ron Thurston realized no one had ever written a book for the 55 million people who work in retail. So he wrote one. Retail Pride: The Guide to Celebrating Your Accidental Career came out in 2020 and still sells around the world. His second book, Human Pride: Optimizing Your Human Potential in a Digital Job Market, followed in 2025 as AI started to crowd people out of the conversation.

In this episode of Author Hour, Ron joins Scribe CEO Travis Stoliker for his third appearance on the show. He lays out his playbook for going from free talks and book giveaways to a represented, paid speaking business: how to ask about budget before naming a fee, how to get bulk book purchases built into an event, and why you're really pitching an experience, not a speech. He also shares his book marketing routine (30 minutes a day on LinkedIn, an email list, and replying to every single message), why he's never handed his engagement off to an assistant or AI, what he tells self-published friends, and why he'd recommend Scribe after going through the process twice.

For more information on Ron Thurston, visit https://scribemedia.com/authors/ron-thurston

For more information on Retail Pride, visit https://scribemedia.com/published-books/retail-pride

For more information on Human Pride, visit https://scribemedia.com/published-books/human-pride