[Editor's Note:And here's PubliCola's real BookNerd, Heidi Broadhead.]
Earlier this week, author Stephen Elliott (Happy Baby, frequent contributor to The Believer) wrote a piece for The Rumpus about how he inadvertently promoted his new memoir, The Adderall Diaries:
A few months ago, sitting on a bunch of advance copies of my new book, The Adderall Diaries, copies that were supposed to go to well placed media outlets, I decided to start The Adderall Diaries Lending Library. My plan was to allow anyone who wanted to read an advance copy of the book the opportunity to do so, provided they forwarded the book within a week to the next reader. I didn’t realize it at the time, but what I was doing played right into the new publishing environment, an environment that is still uncharted and mysterious. A brave new democratic book world where everyone is a potential reviewer.
The experiment turned out to be a huge success. With 400 or so people requesting copies of the book, bloggy book groups and articles popped up all over the place. And, Elliott says, he made such a connection with the readers that he’s actually touring the country and reading in people’s homes:
When I was told I should do a large book tour, rather than going from bookstore to bookstore I sent a note to the 400 advance readers of the book. Now I’m doing a cross-country tour of readings and events primarily in people’s homes. It’s a lot less lonely, I think, to have someone responsible for your event in each town. And I’ll probably sleep on their couches (there’s no budget for hotel rooms). These are mostly people I haven’t met who liked the book enough to invite me into their homes. Hopefully none of them are crazy. They’re probably thinking the same thing about me.
In Seattle, though, he’s reading at Elliott Bay. I like to think of EB as my second home, but it’s not quite the same.
Elliott Bay, Friday, September 18, 7:30 p.m. (free).
(Photo from stephenelliott.com.)
