As I sit here pondering how to start, the CEO side of me says to “keep it tight, professional, and to the point”. However, the writer in me, the creator in me, advises me to just speak from my heart. I’m choosing the latter. Professionalism be damned.
Why did I start Taevo? I’ll be honest. It was for purely selfish reasons. I’m a hungry reader, and I want more and more good books at my disposal. There are no words to describe how much I love to read, so I won’t bore you with trying. Just know that I’ve been a reader since I was two years old, and it is my joy and passion.
It was only natural for writing to become the new love of my life, as reading and writing are simply two sides of the same coin. It wasn’t enough to selfishly devour the stories out there; I wanted to contribute and entice people with stories that would instantly transport them to new worlds as well. I yearned to push their imaginations beyond the limits of their own minds. I was born a writer, but I didn’t discover that until I became an avid reader.
To be honest, I haven’t been happy with the quality of books being published within the past decade. After reading (and paying for) more and more subpar writing, reading stopped being fun for me. It carried no more excitement. My favorite authors weren’t really producing new works as frequently, and talented new authors were growing harder to find. The girl who found time to read even in the supermarket grocery line found herself in a dismal place where she hadn’t read a book in over a year.
And that scared the shit out of me.
Without my love of books, what do I have? They are my escape. My spiritual food, my manna. It’s like my mind is a voracious beast that must devour books constantly. Seriously, books are amazing. They take us to heights we could have never dreamed, and teach us things we thought we could never know. I’ve been all over the world and back without leaving my home, thanks to books. And as soon as my love of reading suffered, so did my writing. Definitely not good, since my entire career is based on writing.
Thankfully, Taevo has brought that love of reading back to me. I’ve made it my goal to build a catalog of high-quality novels that I, and other people, will love to read. I know there are talented writers out there, and I’m going to find them. Many great authors go unnoticed and their work unpublished. All this does in my opinion is deprive the world of another great treasure. I created Taevo to give myself a platform to publish, but that’s not enough for me. I want to help other great writers out there get their compelling stories to the world. I want to thrill other readers as much as I want to be thrilled again.
Taevo is here to offer you great books to read and to teach you how to be a better writer. And as someone who is also technically self-published, Taevo is here to show you how to navigate the publishing world with confidence and knowledge. The goal here is successfully publish your book, and I won’t lie: it’s friggin’ hard. There is a huge learning curve to get over, and many mistakes will be made. But I’ve made those mistakes for you, and don’t mind sharing how you can avoid them.
Even though I originally founded Taevo Publishing in the early 2010s, it doesn’t feel like we’ve been around for long. We are a small, independent publishing company, but we are a traditional publishing company. We are not a vanity press; we are not a “hybrid” publisher. We select our authors based on strict criteria – the main one being that your story has to be moving for the reader, well-written, and challenge our minds in a new way.
As we grow, you will grow with us. As I build the brand of my company, you see the evolution and be glad you were a part of it. Taevo is the brand that will be equated with “excellence”, and I am working day and night to make it happen. Anyone who comes to Taevo should be confident that they will learn everything they need to know from us.
For 2023 and beyond, Taevo is positioning itself as one of the major thought-leaders in digital publishing, and you will get nothing less than the best from us. You can trust my expertise as a writer, published author, and publisher because all I want is for you to write the best damn book possible so I can read it by my pool.
As the CEO of Taevo Publishing, I can promise you that we will only work toward our selfish goal of having more great books for us to read. Yes. That is why I do this. I want to read good books, and am an absolute book snob (a nice one, though). I believe that next great book is yours, and I won’t stop until I have it.
… the voracious beast of my psyche has awakened, and it’s hungry, dammit.
But that’s not all. I was once told that if I have an idea, make it so big that everyone feels like they have a part in it. The truth is, that’s EXACTLY what I’m trying to build through Taevo – it just took the trials and errors of a year to figure it out. I realized that while I have shared valuable info, had a nice-looking site, and a plethora of knowledge to dole out, I wasn’t really helping people the way I wanted to. I wasn’t really solving the problems that clearly existed in the publishing world, and the only way to successfully do that is to attack those issues head-on as an authority, and from a house that is structured and makes sense.
For most of Taevo’s existence, no one really knew what Taevo was about. I could describe it, because it made sense to me when I heard “Taevo”, which is literally ME (a combination of my first and middle name). When I hear the word Taevo, I think of three words: sleek, elegant, and distinguished. More words like “high-class, eloquent, and sophisticated” come to mind, but that’s basically what I want Taevo’s output to symbolize. Whether it’s an eBook, book trailer, tutorial, or an article, I want people to say, “THAT’S what Taevo is known for… producing excellence.”
It required me to restructure the entire house, and really accept the overall vision of Taevo. Taevo is bigger than the publishing house imprint. Taevo is bigger than the non-profits we’ve created to promote literacy in low-income and inner-city areas. Taevo is bigger than the movies we’re going to create from the published novels. It’s bigger than the magazine, e-zine, and anything else we put out, and I had to finally accept that, instead of keeping Taevo “the brand” inside of the small publishing box.
Taevo Publishing is a traditional house where a team of dedicated people can take control of the images presented to our world. It’s a place where we can empower ourselves to actually influence the kind of change we want to see in the world. Taevo is a world where we connect every aspect of media across all spectrums, and make sure that our talented creators – and we’re not talking about those signed to Taevo or working for Taevo, we mean ALL of our people out there in the multimedia realm – are showcased properly. We know talent exists out there across a myriad of platforms, and we are on an active search for you because we are building more than a network. We are going to build a web of industry experts, insiders, and contributors that is so tightly woven, no one will fall through the cracks.
Who are we? What is Taevo? Why did I start this company? And why aren’t we doing the things we set out to do originally?
As of January 2023, Taevo Enterprises is a multi-media company that houses the publishing imprint, Taevo Books d.b.a. Taevo Publishing. The publishing side of Taevo currently powers our vision, but it is very quickly growing into the seeds of a bigger vision.
Taevo Enterprises also contains Taevo Productions, which will handle book trailers and the conversion of books into movies. We know that there are people out there trying to put more insightful, thought-provoking images out there. It’s hard to do when you feel like you have no support. However, we are here, and we will gather others. We will build the support that we ALL need to succeed, and we’ll do it one day, one word, one project at a time.
Why? How? Taevo Enterprises will also assist with powering future non-profit organizations, like Black Bird (our magazine), Obsidian Oasis (our minority writer’s support group), and the BCA, Black Creators’ Association. We also want to partner with other traditional BIPOC publishing companies to form a stronger Black Independent Publishers network (BLIPS on the radar, perhaps?), while also partnering with non-profit organizations to promote specific causes that are important to us, like domestic violence, veterans support, PTSD, adult and childhood literacy, eco-sustainability, and poverty.
I know what I want us to be. Is it wrong to be so bold and ambitious? Is it wrong to say that I want the best for my people, and that I believe it begins with what we feed our mind? Am I wrong to say that I want to see more libraries, schools, and bookstores that house books by African-American authors and actually expand our minds? Not just the minds of Black people, but of everyone (because this weird stigma exist that anything by a Black person is exclusively for Black people, and everyone else has to stay away). Insight and wisdom are still buried deep within our blood and history, and it’s time that we tap back into it and begin to put it on paper again. We have the power to build this era’s Library of Alexandria – but only through a collective effort and the courage to empower ourselves to start a movement.
Taevo is part of that movement. It’s bigger than me. It’s bigger than my clients. It’s bigger than my authors, who have been the most patient, wonderful people in the world. I thank them from the bottom of my heart, because they and only they, truly understand the true frustrations, hold ups, and rigors that exist in the publishing world.
Yes, Taevo is rebuilding its roster of authors that are signed to exclusive publishing deals, and we are preparing to take on another – if all goes right with the coordination of a literary agent. The point is, they all went through the official submission process and were accepted to a traditional publishing deal. They pay no money out-of-pocket, and Taevo owns their publishing rights. Because of this, they TRULY should have been my priority for all of 2015, but looking back, I can see that I made a lot of mistakes as a new entrepreneur.
I’ve been juggling way too much, and oftentimes, they were placed on the backburner due to the obligations I had to my paying clients. Honestly, it was kind of a sucky year for them (in my opinion), because they didn’t get the attention they deserved, their books didn’t get the marketing and promotion needed, and I almost had a nervous breakdown trying to run a small book publishing company.
The point is, I realized my mistake, owned it, and am embracing the reality that stretches before me: if I am to allow Taevo to grow into what it is destined to be, I have to bring on help for 2016. I have to hire on and start growing the team that will help orchestrate the growth of this brand from within, and help me push our mission and goals forward.
That means I can’t be on social media all day, even though my company must show a strong social media presence. It means I can’t handle all of the content writing, even though my company’s reputation and brand are dependent on fresh, new content weekly. It means that I can’t host the contests, the campaigns, and be the liaison between the authors and the actual publishing process anymore. I have to bring on young, innovative people fresh out of college whose desire is to gain working knowledge that helps them compete on a corporate level. I want people who are fired up and want to learn, who want to grow, and who want that sense of satisfaction from knowing they not only made something better, but they imparted some level of change on a greater level.
I want to finally be able to help people in the way that I envision helping them. Not just on a local level, either, but on a nationwide and global level. At Taevo, one of our mottos is, “Impossible is first on our to-do list”, and that was great for when I was first starting up, because it truly felt like I was achieving the impossible every day. I can put that one in the archives for now, though.
Because now is time to live and believe in the next motto, the one that symbolizes our transition to the next level: “An open book can create a rising star.”
When you ask us, “How?”, our reply will be, “Watch and we’ll show you.”
Taevo plans to breed a new generation of rising stars, and this mission is so big, it HAS to involve you on some level, because it involves all of us. Our communities, our children, our schools, our finances, our mental and spiritual health, our wisdom, our ability to survive the legal system… all of those factors and more are dependent on us empowering ourselves through reading and writing again.
I’d be lying if I were to tell you I wasn’t nervous. But I’d be a fool if I told you that I was going to allow that fear to hold me back.
So feel free to sound off! What do you think we can all collectively contribute to something this big? Something that goes beyond books, but now touches on our necessity to directly control the images presented to us?
Taevo Publishing is a BIPOC, woman-owned traditional publishing company that remains dedicated to helping authors write and publish high-quality books. For more information about how to achieve publishing success, join the VIP Club to unlock insider information, or contact us directly at authoronboarding@taevopublishing.com to begin your life-changing transformation.
