Two Suitcases, Two Hundred Dollars and a Dream [2021]
memoir
health journey // migration story // identity
Rajni Raman is an immigrant to the US from India who married her college sweetheart after graduation and moved across the world, leaving behind her family and friends for the promise of a life in America.
As she made deep connections in a new land, she also experienced racial, color, and gender bias and struggled to overcome the hurt, trauma, and shame of childhood sexual abuse. She turned to prayer, faith, and holistic modalities as her health battles raged on for 15 years.
In this interview, Rajni delves into how she not only made her way through to success, but went on to write her incredible story of overcoming.
Here's her incredible story and journey to writing it.
Here's how our book editing relationship panned out when Rajni and I worked together.
What was the problem?
Being an incredibly busy person with an active life in her faith community and family, not to mention running a brand new business and having undergone a bunch of health issues, Rajni spent a couple of years dabbling and making notes but not getting into the writing proper.
Yet she had a wakeup call when a friend had an emergency health matter and it inspired her to know she needed to make the book happen.
She wanted to call in the right people to help and trust they would find her, but still there was the small matter of timing...
How she solved it
While guided by a sense of trust that the right people will come her way, Rajni also made proactive attempts to ask around for an editor.
Finally, she found a referral from her coach and came to have an initial consult with me. I've been asked countless times about test edits, but nothing is better at establishing a connection than a real conversation where I assure my clients that I'll collaborate the whole way through.
Why would you do it this way?
Rajni is inspired by people - the people all around her in her faith community, family, work and friendships. And as such, it was important to call in the right person.
You know when you 'just know' someone is meant to come your way? If you're someone who follows their instincts and is super tuned in to your intuition, you won't need to see a list of credentials for your editor or designer. The right person will just show up at the right time.
About the author
Rajni Raman is an immigrant from India who married her college sweetheart after graduation and moved across the world, leaving behind her family and friends for the promise of a life in America.
As she made deep connections in a new land, she also experienced racial, color, and gender bias and struggled to overcome the hurt, trauma, and shame of childhood sexual abuse.
She turned to prayer, faith, and holistic modalities as her health battles raged on for 15 years.
In this book, Rajni shares her discoveries and lessons from her 30-year Buddhist practice, and her healing journey, recovering from thyroid illness, insomnia, and hormonal imbalance.
Her book is a life memoir chronicling her life journey, filled with heartfelt dreams, gut-wrenching challenges, severe trials, and triumphant victories.
Undefeated Woman - Two Suitcases, Two Hundred Dollars and a Dream is a memoir of a woman transforming from victim to victor.
About the book
In this book, Rajni shares her discoveries and lessons from her 30-year Buddhist practice, and her healing journey, recovering from thyroid illness, insomnia, and hormonal imbalance.
Her book is a life memoir chronicling her life journey, filled with heartfelt dreams, gut-wrenching challenges, severe trials, and triumphant victories.
RAJNI RAMAN
TWO SUITCASES, TWO HUNDRED DOLLARS AND A DREAM
It was such a wonderful experience working with Kris.
My book is self published and became an international bestseller in multiple categories in UK, US and Australia.
Kris and I clicked from our very first call and until I completed my book.
It's a difficult job to find mistakes, make suggestions and be critical, but she does it with a sense of humour. At the same time, she was very encouraging to me as a first time author.
Kris is brilliant at what she does.
