The lady, business owner, entrepreneur, mother, and author. These are the roles Karla Davis-Luster has worn through the years. Inspired and motivated by a few mentors, her largest influencer was her mother who started her on the path of working as a teenager which continued through the years to her story, we currently can witness today. Karla’s journey led her to many corporate high-profile positions with some of America’s largest QSR Industry Corporations such as McDonalds, Burger King and Mrs. Fields were Mrs. Luster held the position as Regional Vice President for the Midwest Division. In 2012, Mrs. Luster decided to part ways with the corporate life taking on the path of entrepreneurship. Here is when she opened the UPS Store in the South-Loop of downtown Chicago and have owned and operated a successful business for the last 9 years. Covid 19, 2020’s pandemic, did not stagnate the entrepreneur, but gave her motivation to pursue several additional endeavors. Mrs. Luster started an online Consignment and Retail Store called Karla’s Klozet during this time.  Her online store also features her own personal clothing line called” The KKZT Collection” that she partners with her children Erin and Keiten Davis. The inspiration did not stop there. During Mrs. Luster corporate days, she was given a huge project to develop and write a training manual for the department where she held the position of Director/Operations Excellence Leader of the Midwest Division. Through her experience, Mrs. Luster learned that she had another underline passion. She developed a love for writing and vowed she would one day author a novel. The pandemic of 2020 gave Mrs. Luster the opportunity to do just that. She authored the spicy novel, “The Woman Tells.”  Karla Davis Luster have achieved much during her career with more to come. So, let us get on with her story.

As such, Ms. Luster replied, I was born and raised in Chicago, in the Englewood area on the city’s Southside she explained. I lived there from the age of two until I was eleven. I must say, as Mrs. Luster spoke, “that area has changed tremendously from when I was a young girl.”  As you have heard me speak about my mother and the things she instilled in me at an early age, I am equally proud of my father. He was a construction worker. One of the projects he worked on and that I like to mention in honor of him, is that he helped build the John Hancock building. One of the most famous structures here in downtown Chicago. My parents divorced when I was two. My mother as hardworking and independent as she was, she raised me along with my sister and two of her younger siblings after my grandmother passed away. Whom I never had the opportunity to meet. I was born three weeks after my grandmother passed away. Nevertheless, my mother’s original profession was in health care for 5 years. After a numerous number of upsets and the stress of watching families lose their loved ones pass away My mother let her emotions get the best of her causing her to change her career. She found comfort in Accounting/Book-keeping, a field she worked in until she retired at the age of fifty-seven. Say’s Mrs. Luster, the one story I remember is my first job was McDonalds.  My mother put me in the car and drove me to the closest McDonalds. I thought I was getting a meal, instead she asked for the manager and asked if he was hiring. It turned out that he was. Go figure said Mrs. Luster!  My second job as a young girl was with Rueben H. Donnelley, the phone book company. I learned basic business skills at Donnelley. I was hired by a family friend, turned mentor later years. I learned to be an office assistant there. After High school, I attended North Central Bible College where I received an Associates degree in Liberal Arts and returned to Chicago to finish a degree in Business Management.

After college life, I entered the work force, got married years later, my two children were born, and I continued to pursue goals. Years later we divorced. The toughest part after divorcing was traveling for work and having to leave my children. Per Mrs. Luster, if I had it to do all over, I would change professions to be able to attend all school activities, not just some.  I am incredibly grateful that I had my mother to step in and function as their babysitter while I was on the road. Thank God for Grandma’s. However, I was also grateful that I had a job that allowed me to provide for my children and give them the opportunity to attend great schools. I must say, although challenging, all my experiences in the workforce helped prepare me for this amazing experience of becoming an author. As I spoke earlier, I developed a passion for writing through a work project. Interviewing couples and researching information for my novel was a cinch, after interviewing and hiring for companies for years. The topic to write on came easy. Relationships is a topic everyone can relate to. I can relate to it being married now for a second time for eleven years. The Woman Tells was very self-fulfilling to write. It was great to include the data I collected and insights from various people conversations, experiences, and occurrences. Embellishment yes, but the realization of life was especially important to me to be present. The Woman Tells is based on reality.

Karla continues- I do want to say that “The Woman Tells” is written from the standpoint that these experiences with love and romance can happen to anyone, regardless of race, creed, color, persuasion, or gender. I did not want to author the book bashing one gender or another. My goal with the book is to share stories that all can relate to and not make it race specific. It is about self-reflection, accountability responsibility and what you want in a relationship.

The past year, Karla Davis Luster hosted an online book reading, in person autograph signing in Chicago, several virtual panels about love and relationships, a virtual release, as well as a three-week run promoting “The Woman Tells on Amazon Live. It has been one blast after another! Mrs. Luster did many podcast interviews, magazine articles and talk show-which has not only helped promote the book but the upcoming sequel! Yes, I am working on a follow up to The Woman Tells where each character in the book will branch off into a book about their own romantic adventures. Then I will bring them all back together for one grand finale book. I am not going to reveal what order this will take place yet! But. y tuned-there will be more to tell from the woman who tells!