Pushing Press

Hey, wanna read an excerpt from the book? Until Amazon gets mine up, check out HarperCollins' "browse inside" feature here.


Question of the day: I love reading author essays, profiles, etc. in magazines - it makes me feel like I know them a little bit when I go to read their book. But I've never known how they land there. Did you send out freelance articles on breast cancer to coincide with the book launch?

Yup, that's exactly what I did, and that's exactly how these articles land there. Well, sort of. In my case, I could pitch various ideas to the editors with whom I had relationships, in the same way that I'd pitch any other piece. But this time, I could also send them a galley, and say, "hey, I have a book coming out in May, how about a piece on such and such?" The biggest assignment that I landed this way was an essay on my friendship with Lizzie that will be in the July issue of Fitness.


My publicist and other folks at Harper have also been doing something similar, and have been doing so since about six months prior to the book's release. They're the ones who crafted a fab press release, as well as the Q/A that's up on my site, and sent these out, along with a galley, to mags/papers/radio stations/tv etc. It takes a lot of people and a lot of work to generate press and buzz for a book, so we've all been in the trenches trying to do so for mine.


Pubbed authors: how have you gotten press on your own release? Readers: what sorts of articles do you like to read about books/authors? What grabs your eye so that you actually go to the store and buy a book?