In 2015, everyone thought I was crazy for leaving corporate security. 10 years and 500+ author campaigns later, I wouldn't trade a single day.
Nobody hands you an instruction manual for following a creative obsession. You figure it out in public, one imperfect event at a time.
In 2015, I made a decision that everyone around me thought was reckless. I had a job. A salary. Security. And I was deeply, quietly miserable.
What I really wanted was entrepreneurship—to talk about books all day, champion writers whose voices needed to be heard, and build spaces where readers could connect without commercial pretense.
Along with my husband Rohan, I co-founded Booknerds. Nobody told us how to do it. There was no playbook for building a literary community startup in India back then. We figured it out as we went.
We hosted our very first event with just 12 people gathered in a tiny café in Dehradun. We were terrified of failing, of nobody showing up, of being judged.
Fast forward 10 years:
→ 150+ offline book events across major Indian cities
→ 200+ literary podcast episodes curated
→ 500+ authors featured and mentored globally
→ Featured in The Times of India, Hindustan Times, and Doordarshan
→ Named Best Reading Club of India at Hyderabad Literature Festival 2023
→ Booknerds Author Agency now serving authors across the US, UK, Australia, Dubai, and India
People still occasionally ask me: 'Don't you ever wish you had stayed in the comfortable 9-to-5?'
My answer is always the same: Not for a single day.
Following a creative purpose is messy, exhausting, and often uncertain. But when you are building something that matters, every sleepless night has meaning. This is only the beginning.
“When you lead with authentic obsession instead of polished sales pitches, readers don’t just buy your book—they become your evangelists.”
Neha Raj is a book marketing strategist and the author of “I Wrote a Book! Now What?” Over the past decade, she has guided more than 500 debut, indie, and traditionally published authors to create sustainable book marketing strategies, create author brands and devoted reader communities.
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