FCBA student to hold book signing Sept. 17

09/14/2011 4:09 PM

By Elise Dismer ’13

In nine months, one Bradley student gave birth to his dream of writing a novel.

In that time, Jesse Reynolds, an accounting major at Bradley, wrote and released his first book, “The Truth behind a Lie: The Road to Commitment,” a self-help guide that focuses readers on the significance of family and soul. 

“Ultimately, I want the reader to focus on the important things in life,” Reynolds said, “not necessarily on monetary factors.”

Reynolds followed his own advice after switching his major from engineering, which he said would have secured him financially, to pursue his passion with a major in accounting.

While Reynolds’ book is not about accounting, he said that’s actually a good thing.

“Just because you’re an accounting major doesn’t mean you don’t have a talent for something else,” Reynolds said. “I have many talents. This is just something that’s in my life on the side of being an accounting student. Just because you’re focused on one thing doesn’t mean you have to ignore the other aspects of your life. As long as you have proper balance, you can be whatever you set your mind to.”

While his love for writing started at an early age, Reynolds said it was a Bradley English course and Dr. Jacqueline Hogan who motivated him to put his ideas in ink.

“Without being at Bradley, I don’t think I would have been able to write this book,” he said. “Dr. Hogan’s class really showed me that I did like to write – that after all those years, I had a passion for it.”

Long before Reynolds started writing his book, he had been sending inspirational text messages to his friends.

“When I used to send out the text messages, people used to respond and say, ‘This was really applicable to my life; this is something that I’m dealing with,’” he said. “So I knew that I had some type of gift or some type of interpretation skills. I just wanted to relay the message from text message to the actual story.”

Reynolds will host a book signing from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 17, in the Garrett Center.

To make his event as inspirational as possible, Reynolds invited people from all over the nation, including poet F.M. Supreme from Chicago, a prophetess from Atlanta and a gospel group from Indianapolis.

Reynolds will be selling copies of his book at the Sept. 17 event. To purchase online, visit http://bookstore.iuniverse.com/Products/SKU-000200134/The-Truth-behind-a-Lie.aspx