Rocking Long Island, Death at Joseph-Beth, & Killing in the Big Apple
As Thanksgiving rolls its turkey neck towards us, Christmas looms ominously around the corner, and one more year of my life expires, we’re super stoked about the next stop on the Essential Guide Rocks America tour: We’ll be rocking LI, NY, Thursday, Dec 2, 7pm. Pitchapalooza: Book Revue in Huntington Long Island, with special All-Star publishing celebrity guests James Levine of the Levine Greenberg Literary Agency, and Mauro DiPreta, Vice President of It Books, ( HarperCollins). Everyone who buys a book gets a free consultation, worth $100.
It’s been an insane month, an insane fall, an insane year. We just performed in 13 cities over the course of three weeks: from the Big Apple to Tinseltown; Miami to Seattle; Portland to Pittsburgh; Denver to St. Louis to San Francisco. We had dizzying triumphs and brutal failures. Our book, The Essential Guide to Getting Your Book Published was officially released on November 3, and we haven’t even had time to celebrate yet. I’ve toured by myself, with the Sex Worker Arts Show, with Arielle, and with the stars from the Chippendale’s Male Strip Show. I’ve never toured with a three-year-old. Especially a three-year old who is Olive. She more fun than all of them. We were worried about what was going to be like to shlep her around America with us, but she proved by far the most resilient and cheerful member of the team. Here are our reports from the road, deep in the trenches of the publishing wars.
Denver Pitchapalooza on New Books West
Big Love from the Big Read Festival in St. Louis bit.ly/akI1Xg
Movie: Great Book Pitch: Winner of St Louis Pitchapalooza, Zach Stovall pitching his book about being a fat bald white guy
The Essential Guide Rocks America Tour Kicks Off
#2: 1st Stop Washington DC: the Borders Incident
#3: NPR Love in DC
#4: Pat Conroy & Scarlet O’Hara On the Road to Pittsburgh
#5: Death @ the Bookstore – The Murder of Joseph-Beth in Pitsburgh
#6: Miss Ida, Daryl & Olive Chilling in Steel Town
#7: The Beauty of Loganberry Books & the Universe’s Lollipop
#8: Dawn Cracks Early in Cleveland
#9: An NPR Homey, Finding Happiness @ Books & Co the Dayton Airport Blues
#10: Stuck in Dayton on the Day That Would Never End
Our awesome Editor Goddess Savanna calls it as she sees it on our Pitchapalooza Barnes & Noble, 86th St., with publishing titans Larry Kirschbaum and Bob Simon.
The Art of the Pitch and our B & N Manhattan Pitchapalooza on Publishers Perspective.
#11: I Love LA! –Hollywood & the Jewish Men-Scared
#12: Vromans Versus Dancing with the Stars, Riding a Donasaur, & a Minnie Mouse Who Needs $
Arielle talks about five books that will help you turn your passion into income, and dispenses wisdom from her years as a literary agent and entrepreneur on LearnVest.
Bradley Charbonneau of Likoma Island & the Book Doctors talk about Effective Author Websites
Arielle interviews Robert Grey of Shelf Awareness on seven ways to get an independent book store to stock your book.
With Thanksgiving a couple of days away, I feel very thankful. For our amazing publisher, Workman, our Editor Goddess, Savannah, and all of our family there, from Susie Bolotin to a beloved colleague who passed away recently, the extraordinary copyeditor Lynn Strong, http://bit.ly/gVdcz. Thankful for all the amazing panelists we had, Larry Kirschbaum of LKJ, Bob Miller new Publisher of Workman, Martha Moody, Nancy Martin, Lee Montgomery of Tin House, Michael Schaub of bookslut, and Alison Hallet of the Portland Mercury, Vince Rause, Anne Trubeck, Sharon Short, author of Death by Deep Dish Pie, Allan Fallow of AARP Electroboy himself Andy Behrman . Betsy Lerner, author of Forest for the Trees. Johnny Evison and Kurtis Lowe in Seattle. I’m thankful for the enormous kindness we received from our good friend Jessica Goldstein, who threw an amazing book party for us in Washington DC, and invited all for NPR friends. I’m also thankful for all the incredible booksellers and lovers who gave us so much generosity and expertise. Jim Levine of Levine Greenberg Literary Agency http://www.levinegreenberg.com/ Steven Sorrentino, Director of Author Promotions for Barnes & Noble, and Edwin Tucker, CRM of 86th St. B & N Harriet Logan of Loganberry Books Kevin Sampsell of Powell’s, Dayton NPR book guy Shaun Yu, Sharon Kelly Roth at Books and Company http://www.booksandco.com/ Ed Nowatski of Publishers Perspective , Mitchell Kaplan of Books and Books and the Miami International Book Festival. My sister Liz, Daisy White, and all the other great babysitters who help us out with Olive. Thanks to all the great writers for all their amazing pitches. And of course I give thanks for Olive and Arielle, my ex-agent and current wife.
The Essential Guide Tour Pitchapalooza #12: Vromans Versus Dancing with the Stars, Riding a Donasaur, & a Minnie Mouse Who Needs $
One of the great things about going on tour is having a day off. Which for us was Sunday. We planned to sleep in, hang out, sunbathe, luxuriate, get a massage, and generally do a total LA chillax. Sadly, Olive did not have the same idea. Olive is 3. Since basically every day is Olive’s day off, she got up at 5:30am ready to PAR-TAY! Arielle did the 5:30am-8:00am shift. David did the 8:00am-10:30am shift. He took Olive swimming. She got them 43 glasses of lemonade (from the free lemonade cooler by the pool) which she insisted David drink. Then we headed to one of our favorite LA eateries, Campanile. It was shockingly empty for a Sunday brunch , and we thought: maybe they now suck. But there was no suckage, only excellence. Sourdough pancakes with crème fraiche. Pochaed eggs over proscuitto and arugula with scallion oil. Dee-lish! As an added bonus, the gorgeous hostess gave Olive some fish food to feed the fishies in the pool up front. Olive loves feeding fishies. A bleachy blonde with blood red lips sat next to us. Olive told her she liked her sparkly sweater. Blondy was clearly trying for a Gwen Stefani look, but only got as far as 2nd rate Courtney Love
Next door to Campanile is the famed La Brea Bakery. Arielle continued her search for the greatest soft pretzel in America, David got a boo-yeah macaroon that was an otherworldly blend of crunch and goo. And Olive had her first gingerbread lady. Then out to the ocean and Santa Monica pier. Olive was dancing and squeeling with glee as soon as she spotted the ocean. She went on a cool old-school carousel with real wooden horses. Drove a cab. Rode a dinosaur. Steered a rocket ship. Then the coup de grace, Elmo, Mickey and Minnie Mouse. In the flesh. We don’t know how Olive has become so infatuated with Mr. and Mrs. Mouse. We have no Disney characters in our home. In fact, David wrote a screenplay for Disney and it was such a horrifying experience, he basically breaks out in hives whenever he’s around anything Disney. Has it been hammered into the DNA of American children with generations of relentless Mouseketeer marketing?
So Olive went sprinting over to Minnie and tries to give her a big hug. The human inside the very authentic Minnie outfit held a dollar between thumb and forefinger (International sign for: Give me cash). Minnie needs money to hug child. When David refused on principle, Minnie turned her back on Olive and marched away in a giant rodent huff. It was Disney–and Hollywood– and America–in a perfect symbolic nutshell. Beloved childhood icons, fully branded, working as mercenaries extorting money from children. Then there was the Jedi Knight, a homicidal maniac waving his $3 plastic light saber while wandering around muttering to himself, “So, you’d like to get rescued by a Jedi? I bet you would. Oh yeah, lady, the Force will be all over you.”
But there was a magical Argentinian singer/guitarist filling the night with the most exquisite rhythmic music as the sun set soft and pink over the Pacific and Olive enchanted the crowd with some wild improvisational dance. The Argentinian we were happy to pay. Then we were off to Monte Alban, on Santa Monica Blvd. They promised authentic Oaxacan cuisine. And they delivered. Holy mole, it was good! Fresh, flavorful, familiar yet utterly unique. Arielle had life-changing chicken soup with raw tomatoes, onions, jalapenos, and avocado chopped in right before serving. David a burrito luxuriating in a mole blanket. Sated, sun-drenched and exhausted, we collapsed back at the hotel, in love with life and each other.
The next day, after more swimming with Olive, as we drove to our Pasadena Pitchapalooza, we had a bad feeling. Sure enough, when we got to Vroman’s, one of the employees told us, “I hope you don’t expect a crowd—it’s Dancing with the Stars night.” You know you’re in trouble when the writers won’t come out because they have to watch Dancing with the Stars. “Why don’t they digitally record it?” we asked. “Oh no,” the employee looked at us like we were crazy, “they have to watch it live so they can vote.”
But the events coordinator, Connie, could not have been lovelier. She participated in the event (and we are always grateful and happy when booksellers give their two cents). We talked a lot about befriending your local bookseller. Finding the expert in your category and gently, respectfully pick their brain about your book idea and similar books you should know about. Connie told us about the interview questionnaire at Vroman’s. How you must demonstrate your passion for and knowledge of books. If you’ve never been to Vroman’s, it is one of the largest and coolest independent bookstores around. Not only do they have a huge selection of books, but really cool merchandise. On this visit, Arielle discovered T-shirts with the covers of out-of-print editions of famous books.
We actually ended up with a nice gaggle of writers. And Tony, a fan of David’s, showed up after dental surgery and bought 3 books! The winner pitched an everything guide to Disneyland. Because LittleMissMatched (the company Arielle is the co-founder of) has a store in Disneyland, we know just how rabid these Disney fans are.
We were sad to bid farewell to Hotel California, but happy to take a little of Hollywood with us in the form of incredible edibles from Joan’s. So happily, Southern California lived on in our hearts, and our bellies.
The Book Doctors Rock America
UPCOMING EVENTS
July 27, 3:30pm Politics & Prose, Washington DC
September 18, 7pm Brooklyn Book Festival, Brooklyn Public Library
October 19, 20, James River Writers Conference, Richmond Virginia
Here’s what people are saying about The Essential Guide To Getting Your Book Published:
“I started with nothing but an idea, and then I bought this book. Soon I had an A-list agent, a near six-figure advance, and multiple TV deals in the works. Buy it and memorize it. This little tome is the quiet secret of rockstar authors.”—New York Times best-selling author Timothy Ferris, The 4-Hour Workweek: Escape 9-5, Live Anywhere, and Join the New Rich,
“It is a must-have for every aspiring writer… thorough, forthright quite entertaining.”—Khaled Hosseini, New York Times bestselling author of the Kite Runner
“Before you write your own book, read this one first.”—Jonathan Karp, editor-in-chief, Simon and Schuster
Here’s an article about Pitchapalooza in The New York Times.
Here’s a link to a blog about their Pitchapalooza at Barnes & Noble 86th St., with publishing titans Larry Kirschbaum and Bob Simon.
Here’s a link to an article about the Art of the Pitch and their Pitchapalooza on Publishers Perspective.
Here’s a write-up of a wild Pitchapalooza at the great book store Book Revue. PITCHAPALOOZA
Here’s a MINI-MOVIE about Pitchapalooza-TRY NOT TO CRY.