Natasha Miller - Relentless: Homeless Teen to Achieving the Entrepreneur Dream

ACCOLADES

Relentless is a page-turner Natashas a fabulous writer, I couldnt put it down its brilliant writing.

JACK CANFIELD

New York Times Best-Selling Author of the Chicken Soup for the Soul series.

Natasha Miller is a survivor, a kick-ass entrepreneur, and, now, a remarkable author. We have a lot to learn from her story and the challenges shes overcome. Relentless is a terrific read on leadership and business, yes, but its also a blueprint for how to be a very special human being.

SCOTT OMELIANUK

Editor in Chief, Inc. Magazine

From a homeless teenager surviving in a youth shelter, to becoming a hugely successful entrepreneur, Natasha Miller is living proof that dedicated hard work and steely determination can elevate all of us. Relentless is a source of information and inspiration for every reader.

JAY FULCHER

CEO Zenefits

Music saves lives. It saved Natasha Millers. After getting dropped off at a homeless shelter on Christmas Day at age 16, chased out of her home by a nightmare mother, she used her violin and her singing to lift her out of grim circumstances and lead her to start a music production company that made lists of the fastest-growing companies in the countrya story Tasha tells with the same kind of unvarnished candor and heartfelt sentiment that always illuminated her beautiful singing.

JOEL SELVIN

#1 New York Times best-selling author and music critic for the San Francisco Chronicle

Natasha Millers book hooked me within the first paragraph. The story of her life is told with such colorful description, it feels as if you are standing in the kitchen while her mom is trying to kill her. (What?) Its emotional, entertaining and informative. Natasha is one of the rare few. I am wowed!

KIMBERLY FULCHER

Award-winning author and life coach

Relentless is a beautiful and gripping story. You will not want to put it down! I laughed, I cried (sometimes at the same moment) and I felt inspired by the incredibly well written story by Natasha Miller. Natasha is living proof that dedicated hard work and steely determination can elevate all of us. Relentless is a source of information and inspiration for every reader.

CAROLINE LIND

2x Olympic Gold Medalist

I met Natasha when I was the CEO of Inc. Magazine and she had just secured a place on the Inc. 5000, which means wed identified her company, Entire Productions, as one of Americas fastest growing. I could not have conceived that the confident, business-savvy entrepreneur standing before me had once been abandoned as a child, had faced tragedies that would have floored lesser beings and had also had an unrelated previous successful career in music. But all that, improbable as it seemed, is there in Relentless. Natashas booknot to mention her amazing lifeis a tribute to the redemptive power of art, friendship and entrepreneurship. Most of all, its a tribute to the grit and creativity of a self-described sad, anxious kid from the Midwest who found a way. Relentless will stretch your concept of what is possible in life. Read it! You will not be able to put it down.

ERIC SCHURENBERG

CEO Mansueto Ventures

(Inc. Magazine and FastCompany Magazine)

Natasha Miller is a force in every wayincredibly impressive even if you dont know what shes overcome. While Relentless starts by taking us into a surreal childhood that would have decimated others, it ends up showing us how to not only survive but also thrive. Surprising, inspiring and altogether unique, this is a story that stays with you long after your close the last page.

ANNA DAVID

New York Times bestselling author and founder of Legacy Launch Pad Publishing

Relentless is beautifully written and much of it feels as if you are sitting in a room listening to an old friend tell you stories about her childhood. The words flow naturally onto the page. I truly believe that Natashas entrepreneurial spirit is what pushed her through the hardest of times. She was able to release music, manage gigs, start businesses, and raise her daughter all at once. Her ability to shift from one project to another and figure out how to make things work, especially through the Covid pandemic, is one hundred percent admirable. One of my favorite parts of the book is when Natasha describes her relationship with famous songwriter, Bobby Sharp. I felt like he became a grandfather figure to her and motivated her through stories of his own to reach for her goals.

Relentless is a book that any person can learn a great deal from. No one is without some kind of struggle, and if a sixteen-year-old homeless girl from Iowa can make it onto Inc.s 5000 list of Americas fastest-growing companies, then really, the sky is the limit.

KRISTI ELIZABETH

San Francisco Book Review

2022 by Natasha Miller

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photography, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the author.

Requests for permission to make copies of any part of the work should be mailed to the following address: .

Published and distributed by Poignant Press

Illustration by Amelia Noyes

Book cover design by Marcela Murillo

Author Photo by Valerie Carr

#beRelentless #RelentlessOnes

Library of Congress Control Number: XXXXXXXX

ISBN:

Paperback 979-8-985600-20-9

eBook 979-8-985600-21-6

Hardcover 979-8-9856002-2-3

Audiobook 979-8-9856002-3-0

DEDICATION

For Bennett, who continues to help me rewrite my history.

DISCLAIMER

This book is a memoir. It reflects the authors present recollections of experiences over time and as recounted in her journals from 10 years of age, official transcripts, emails, texts and letters. Some names and characteristics have been changed, some events have been compressed, and some dialogue has been recreated.

TRIGGER WARNING

This memoir includes potentially disturbing and triggering content as outlined below. I encourage you to prepare yourself emotionally before proceeding in case reading it will be traumatizing for you.

Self-Harm

Verbal, Mental, Emotional Abuse

Physical Abuse

Child Neglect

Depression

Mental Illness

Stillborn birth

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION

The introduction may consist of an important chord or progression that establishes the tonality and groove for the following music, or they may be important but disguised or out-of-context motive or thematic material.

JAZZ COMPOSITION: THEORY AND PRACTICE

Hey, Im Jamie. Co-writer and editor for Relentless.

The publishing industry can be quite the grind at times, and I confess to sometimes drowning in the ocean of empty words and vapid stories, fame sharks trying to monetize Tik Tok, wannabe influencers and self-help speakers desperate to build their brand. Cant you send me something with some depth? I begged my agent.

How about helping an entrepreneur in San Francisco do a business book? she asked.

Like some slapdash pseudo-economic propaganda? I groaned. Ugh.

Talk to her, she suggested. What could it hurt?

And thats how I met a funny, silly, somewhat insecure band nerd from Iowa, a nice Midwestern girl who had overcome a hellish childhood to become NorCals hottest jazz chanteuse, founder of an award-winning company, speaker, educator, and business virtuoso.

Even this word-weary Nashville literary vet fell in love with her sweet, sad, messy story as we bonded over the joy of sarcasm, jokes about Beaverdale, math anxiety, the secret musical genius of Duran Duran, and the fact that, well, Im also a former band nerd (ADHD drummer) who stayed in trouble for talking too much in class.