Cali Sephora Chapman: From Recovery Room to Reading Revolution

During my recovery from scoliosis surgery and spinal fusion, I was spending most of my summer in bed. Books became my escape, my entertainment, and my connection to adventure when I couldn't move around freely. But I kept running into the same frustrating problem: I'd order what I thought was the next book in a series, only to discover it was book three when I needed book one, or book seven when I hadn't read book five yet.

Having lived in Spain, Mexico, and Ukraine, and spending three years sailing with my family in the Pacific, I'd always been good at solving problems and adapting to new situations. But this book ordering chaos was driving me crazy! I thought, 'There has to be a better way for readers to figure out the correct order for book series.'

That's when I decided to stop complaining and start building.

Being confined to bed actually gave me something I'd never had before: uninterrupted time to learn. I'd always been interested in technology, but between school, traveling, and my active lifestyle, I'd never had months to really dive deep into programming and web development.

My dad became my co-founder and mentor during this time. While I focused on understanding the technical side and user experience, he helped with the business aspects and more complex development challenges. It became a true family project - born from my frustration but built with collaboration.

I started by researching how other book platforms worked, what readers complained about most, and what features were missing. The more I learned, the more convinced I became that series readers needed their own specialized platform.

My international experience really shaped how I approached building BooksinOrder.ai. Having lived in different countries and being part of reading communities everywhere from Tennessee book clubs to Spanish literature groups, I understood that reading habits and preferences vary, but the frustration with series order is universal.

I didn't want to build just another book database. I wanted to create something that would genuinely help readers like me - people who love getting lost in long series, who participate in book clubs, who want to track their progress, and who definitely don't want spoilers from reading books out of order.

Every feature we've built comes from real experience. The spoiler protection exists because I accidentally spoiled a major plot point by reading book four before book two. The progress tracking exists because I wanted to celebrate finishing long series. The book club features exist because I've seen how hard it is to coordinate group reading when everyone's at different points.

What started as a personal project during recovery has grown into something that helps thousands of readers worldwide. We now have a database of over 749,000 books, active book clubs, and a community that's constantly helping us improve the platform.

I'm still a high school student, balancing my studies with running the platform, but that's actually been an advantage. I understand what younger readers want, I'm not stuck in 'how things have always been done,' and I'm building this during the time in my life when I'm reading the most series myself.

My recovery taught me that sometimes the best innovations come from personal challenges. My international background taught me that good solutions can work across cultures. And my love for reading taught me that when you solve a problem for yourself, you're probably solving it for a lot of other people too.

We're currently working on a mobile app that will bring all the features our community has requested - virtual book club meetings, real-time progress sharing, enhanced spoiler protection, and tools for coordinating local meetups. Every feature we build is based on feedback from real users, not just what we think people want.

My goal isn't to compete with Amazon or Goodreads - they're great at what they do. My goal is to be the best possible solution for series readers specifically. When someone finishes a trilogy and wonders what to read next, when a book club wants to tackle a 10-book series together, when a parent wants to help their teen navigate complex fantasy series - that's when BooksinOrder.ai should be their first thought.

I'm proof that you don't need to be a Silicon Valley executive or have a computer science degree to solve real problems with technology. Sometimes you just need to be frustrated enough by a problem to actually do something about it.