Summer Book Talk Day 3 : Know Your Publicist - St. Martins. (Giveaway)

It's Day 3 of Summer Book Talk, an event co-hosted by Kindle and Me, Maji Bookshelf and Books of Amber! As promised, we have a ton of fun stuff coming your way the entire week including some awesome giveaways . So make sure you check back the blog every day for the next week! If you're wondering what this event is all about, click here to see the post explaining it all!

St. Martin's Press is one of the United States' largest publishers, bringing to the public some 700 titles a year under eight imprints, which include St. Martin's Press (mainstream and bestseller books), St. Martin's Griffin (mainstream paperback books, including science fiction and romance), Minotaur (mystery, suspense, and thrillers), Picador (specialty books), Thomas Dunne Books (suspense and mainstream), and Truman Talley Books (business and speciality books). St. Martin's Press's current editor in chief is George Witte.

*Taken from Wikipedia.

Today I have the super nice Katie Bassel from St. Martin's Publishing who is the publicist for a lot of awesome authors, including Amanda Hocking! I asked Katie some questions about publishing to get some insider info on what her job actually involves and here's what she had to say...

As bloggers/readers, we only know our side of it - the part involving ARCs. Could you please tell us more about your role as a publicist and what it involves?

We spend a lot of time planning author tours, coordinating with bookstores all over the country to host signings and we do a lot of reaching out to radio and television stations to schedule interviews. We host meet and greets with the authors to allow editors and bloggers the chance to meet with them and learn more about their books. But, as you mention, sending out ARCs is a huge part of it! That’s one of the first encounter our magazine and newspaper contacts have with our books. After they’ve received them and reviewed them, we follow up to find out if they’ll be including a review.

How did you get into the publishing industry? Is it as glamorous as it seems to us bibliophiles?

Well, I didn’t follow the normal path. I worked in Corporate Sales & Marketing for the St. Louis Cardinals for four years before moving to New York and starting in the publicity department with St. Martin’s. I DO have a journalism degree though, I’m sure that helped!

What’s a typical day at work like?

A lot of what I mentioned above in question one. And, in addition to that, we also like to check our Google alerts for anything – articles/reviews – that have been written about our authors and their books.

How is it decided on how much publicity a book requires before its release? Is it sometimes the same for both published authors as well as debut authors?

As much as possible for all our authors! And, as you can imagine, a lot of it depends on the reception of the book from the media.

How is a media kit usually put together?

We usually like to include a press release for the book, a biography and picture of the author, praise for the author and high-profile reviews or interviews with the author.

How do you discover new authors?

Our editors, VP of Publicity get that fun job, meeting with agents, keeping an eye for the next great Amanda Hocking!

Tell us your top 3 favorite books.

I’m boring. I like all the bestsellers, huge fan of the Girl with the Dragon Tattoo and the rest of the series. Into Thin Air is one of my all-time favorites. What else…Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe and two classics, the Great Gatsby and Great Expectations.

Could you tell us about a few exciting upcoming titles from St. Martins?

The books I’m excited about probably differ from what your readers are excited about! But I’m about to start Savage Continent by Keith Lowe, which comes out July 3. It’s about Europe in the aftermath of WW II, a pretty undocumented period of history. It’s gotten a lot of really great early reviews and I’m excited to read about a time I don’t know much about. And I’m obviously super excited to read Where We Belong, by Emily Giffin. I saw the ARCs today and they looked so beautiful!

I think I got answers to the majority of questions that I had about publicists. Thanks so much Katie, for taking the time to answer my questions! I'm sure a lot of readers're as curious as I am.

Giveaway Terms and Conditions :

• Giveaway is International.
  
• Giveaway ends on August 15th, 2012.
  
• Winner has 36 hours to respond or a new one will be picked.

a Rafflecopter giveaway Make sure to come back every day until July 31st to check out the rest of the posts of The Summer Book Talk and also, for a chance to win some fabulous prizes! Don't forget to visit Maji Bookshelf and Books Of Amber and check out their posts as well!