Cavett: I Wrote It, Must I Also Hustle It?
Excerpted gems about publishing and marketing your book from the one and only Dick Cavett:
A favorite publishing technique for ruining years of hard work is to fumble getting the book into stores until after its limited “shelf life” has expired and it’s all too late — and the maddened author wishes to assemble a Molotov cocktail and . . .
(Should the idea of a major publishing house seemingly forgetting to put a book in bookstores until too late seem farfetched, there’s a way you can verify this: ask anybody. And for a firsthand account by poor me, read this previous column.)
Way back I learned that some enterprising entrepreneurs were offering a service teaching how to plug your book on TV. I had on my show one of their graduates, apparently, who had gone a little overboard on one piece of advice. See if you can guess what it was:
Mr. Cavett, when I conceived of my book “Misadventure” [let’s call it] I thought, I want “Misadventure” to be different. I want people to say, I bought “Misadventure” because “Misadventure” sounds like the kind of book . . . etc.
Have you guessed? Somewhere near the dozenth chiming of the title the audience began to make a sort of audible wince. I let it go, moved on to one more guest, and in thanking the guests and bringing the show to a close, I allowed myself a minor pleasure. I thanked the author and added, “Did I give you a chance to mention the title of your book?”
The burst of laughter seasoned with scattered applause caused me momentary guilt. It soon passed.
