Quick version:
Anna David is the New York Times bestselling author of eight books and founder of Legacy Launch Pad Publishing. She has appeared repeatedly on Today, The Talk, Good Morning America and numerous other programs and been a featured speaker at three different TedX events. She's hosted numerous podcasts, including On Good Authority, and speaks at organizations and events about sharing your story to build your business.
She's been written about in Entrepreneur, Forbes, The Huffington Post, The Daily Beast, The New York Post and The Hollywood Reporter, among many other publications.
At Legacy Launch Pad, she helps helps her clients achieve similar results. Since its inception, Legacy Launch Pad has published over 50 books, many of which have become Wall Street Journal and USA Today bestsellers. As a result of their books, Legacy Launch Pad clients have landed on TEDx stages and in mainstream media and have added hundreds of thousands of dollars to their bottom line.
She lives in Hollywood, California with her boyfriend, filmmaker Jim Agnew, their son Benjamin and their cranky-looking cat Bernie.
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Incredibly long version.
My name is Anna David and I enjoy taking photos where I rest my chin on a hand. In 1999, I was an unemployed dog walker. Yes, you could argue that walking a dog was technically employment but when you’re paid $10 a day to clean up after a dog, it’s hard to convince anyone that you’re actually a writer (especially when you’re a cat person).
But really, the best way for you to get to know me may be through the timeline I’ve created below.
TIMELINE:
1977: Found out the youngest book author was younger than me and got depressed (true)
1980: Started submitting to children’s publications (and getting rejected)
1991: Got an internship at Hartford Monthly magazine during last minute panic that I had no work experience and would never get hired after graduating college
1991: Started writing restaurant reviews for the college paper due to same panic
1991: Resurrected the defunct college literary magazine and became its editor (the panic made me very productive!)
1992: Interned at Mirabella magazine
1992: Read my college boyfriend's screenplay, Good Will Hunting, and thought it was pretty good but gave him some notes. Five years later, no one was more shocked than I was when it won him the Oscar for best screenplay and he became the biggest movie star of our generation
1992: Graduated from college and heard from my childhood friend Mackenzie that Entertainment Weekly paid its interns. Got hired as an intern at EW and promptly did nothing to take advantage of the opportunity by proving myself to editors and instead worked on scamming premiere invites off of them
1993: Was a bridesmaid in Mackenzie's wedding to her co-worker at DE Shaw and felt sad for her two years later when her new husband Jeff decided they should move to Seattle to sell books online
1992: Did not buy stock in their fledgling company, Amazon, because who would buy anything online?
1993: Became an editorial assistant at Parenting magazine in San Francisco, and spent three years writing articles on things like how breastfeeding can crack your nipples and the awesomeness of Barney the Dinosaur
1996: Moved to Los Angeles and became a full-time freelancer (only a semi oxymoron) at People magazine
1997: Fired from People magazine despite not having a real job there
1998-2000: Got up to nothing good and did a s*itload of cocaine
May, 2000: Got sober, entire life changed and landed a high-profile job as a columnist
2002: Wrote a story for Playboy magazine that featured photos of me in such limited clothing that my mother was forbidden from looking at it; the story, “Sex in Two Cities,” was optioned and made into a reality TV pilot for TBS
2003: Was hired as the dating expert on G4’s Attack of the Show, co-hosting a segment with Olivia Munn; started appearing on numerous other TV shows, including Red Eye, Showbiz Tonight, The CBS Morning Show, The Talk, The Insider, Hannity & Colmes and various other programs on Fox News, CNN, MSNBC, NBC, VH1, MTV and E
2007: Published a “Modern Love” in The New York Times
2007: HarperCollins published my first novel, Party Girl, and Sony optioned the movie rights
2007: Started getting press, some of it even good
2009: HarperCollins published my second novel, Bought
2010: Started speaking at colleges about addiction and recovery
2010: HarperCollins published my first anthology, Reality Matters
2010: Hired as the editor of The Fix, the first addiction recovery-focused website
2011: HarperCollins published my memoir Falling for Me
2013: Simon & Schuster published the book I wrote with Tom Sizemore (RIP), By Some Miracle I Made It Out of There; the book sold so many copies that it hit The New York Times bestseller list
2014: Created the AfterPartyMagazine website, which included a podcast and storytelling show, and sold it to the owners of The Fix
2014: Soft Skull published my second anthology, True Tales of Lust and Love
2017: Was one of the keynote speakers (along with a guy named Tony Robbins) at the Genius Network Annual Event
2017: Left AfterParty, floundered for a bit
2018: Spoke at three different TEDx events
2018: Created the company now called Legacy Launch Pad Publishing
2018: Released our first book, Aiming High, and watched the author/our client land a six-figure spokesperson deal, add hundreds of thousands of dollars to his company's bottom line and launch a lucrative speaking career. Went, "Huh, a book can really transform any entrepreneur's career, no matter their business! Oh, and traditional publishing is archaic!"
2018: Created and launched courses on writing and launching books
2018: Released the Party Girl audio book; sold the Party Girl movie rights to Martin Scorsese's producer
2019: Signed dozens of clients at Legacy Launch Pad and began launching a steady stream of books
2020: Released Make Your Mess Your Memoir, which landed me an appearance on Good Morning America and brought in hundreds of thousands of dollars in new business
2020: Started speaking at organizations and events about sharing your story to build your business
2020: Switched the focus of my podcast to book launches
2021: Got the rights to Party Girl back from HarperCollins and re-launched it, adding new talent to the movie in development and taking over an iconic Hollywood corner with it
2021: Along with boyfriend Jim Agnew, acquired Bernie the wonder cat
2022: Became a contributor on the topic of using books to build a business for Fast Company and Entrepreneur and signed on to be the book critic for KATU TV/Portland
2022: Watched a Legacy Launch Pad book hit the #1 spot on the Wall Street Journal bestseller list
2023: Along with boyfriend Jim, welcomed a (human) son, Benjamin; because of Legacy's amazing team, can both be an obsessive mom and watch the company thrive.
