“Don’t scream at your publicist” and other tips for authors.

An Anonymous Patron pointed us to This Book Standard piece about authors and their publicists.

Still, a lot of the more vocal authors are not all that savvy about the business end of publishing. “The thing about authors,� my publicist friend said bluntly, “is that some of them just don’t get it.� Her remark intrigued me, but, unfortunately, she was called into a marketing meeting before I had the chance to ask what she meant by saying that some authors just don’t get it. Which is why I’ve spent the past couple of days e-mailing publicists and editors, asking them if her statement is true, whether there are aspects of the publishing industry about which authors are ignorant, and further, whether publishers should be educating authors better on certain areas of the industry. Basically, everyone I spoke to agreed that many authors often don’t get it, particularly with regard to publicity, which always seems to shoulder much of the blame for a book’s failure to perform to the author’s expectations.