An April 9, 2009 program co-sponsored by the National Writers Union and the Brandeis Women's Studies Research Center

(report by Barbara Beckwith)

When Ruth Nemzoff was preparing to publicize her first book, Don't Bite Your Tongue: How to Foster Rewarding Relationships with Your Adult Children (Palgrave), she talked with everyone she knew who had written a book. They told her the bad news: your publisher will not do anything to publicize your book. These authors were angry, but Nemzoff's approach was to "embrace reality" and accept the fact that "I was going to have to do it myself."

Her book came out in July 2008: over the next nine months, she'd done 79 events. Her publisher, considered a great publisher, got only six of these and did not reliably send books to her gigs: she once drew an audience of 180 at Tufts parents' weekend, but couldn't sell books because the publisher hadn't sent them. So she learned that she needed to buy and sell her own stash: "I'd just have to schlepp the books with me." She sold her book at a discount that was competitive with Amazon but not less than what independent bookstores charge for it.

She discovered that libraries do more publicity (post flyers, post on their website, send to their email list, get a notice in the local paper, and maybe local access TV) than most bookstores do (Brookline Booksmith is an exception). On chaine bookstore gig drew just 5 people, and other at a Nashua NH library drew 140, and Newton Library drew 190. Her presentations are persuasive: "I sell books to 20 to 50 percent of my audience." She parlays each appearance into more gigs by asking the event organizer, if s/he were pleased with the turnout, to recommend her to heads of other venues; she also asks the audience to recommend her as a speaker. Since libraries sometimes have money, she always asks: "Do you have an honorarium?" If she's asked how much she wants, she answers "the usual and customary amount."

She asked 100 friends to help in one of many possible ways: a Brandeis student put her on Facebook and linked her in ("I don't post - I'm just on it") and a Bentley web-savvy supporter got her tags to drive traffic to her website. A friend taught her code so she could update her events page without having to wait for her busy webmaster to find free time. As a bad speller, she's learned "I have to check my stuff with someone before I post" -- the National Writers Union once thought I was fake because I misspelled an email."