The Author Event Primer: How to Plan, Execute and Enjoy Author Events

By Chapple Langemack

Author events are a great way to build excitement and interest in books and reading. Now you can successfully plan and host author visits. This guide covers every step from why you should hold author events and how your organization can benefit to such logistics as selecting an author, choosing the type of event and venue, publicity, set-up, escorting, crowd control, and managing the autograph line. Filled with practicial tips, proven techniques, and anecdotes, this book will inspire you and get you through your author events with flying colors.

Author events are a great way to build excitement and interest in books and reading. With this guide in hand, you can easily and successfully plan and host author visits. The primer covers every step. It begins by explaining why you should hold author events and how your organization can benefit. It then goes on to such logistics as selecting an author, choosing the type of event and venue, publicity, setup, escorting, crowd control, and managing the autograph line. Filled with practical tips, proven techniques, and engaging anecdotes, this book will inspire you and get you through your author events with flying colors.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1591583020
• ISBN13: 9781591583028
• Release Date: January 2007
• Publisher: Libraries Unlimited
• Length: 204 Pages
• Weight: 0.70 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.6" x 6.1" x 9.2"

Customer Reviews

Planning for the perfect author event

The first page of Langemack's The Author Event Primer answers the burning question of why have an author visit in the first place. She offers many logical reasons such as [to] "promote books and reading," and "provide a book for bringing people into your venue." My favorite reason is "[t]hey are wondrous beings ... and once they've engaged us so skillfully on the page, we're often left wondering what they themselves are like." If you suddenly find yourself in charge of planning an author event, or helping with one for the first time, Langemack's work provides a detailed roadmap on how to plan, organize, promote and host the event, as well as determining which author(s) to invite. Langemack thoughtfully includes a chapter on "Hosting and Escorting," tips on what to do when you are waiting for the author to arrive, and what to do in case something goes wrong with your event. Fourteen chapters of information guide you through the process of the why? who? what? where? when? and how?, to fundraising, promoting, and managing the event itself. Also included is advice on what to do when the event ends, evaluations and follow-ups, and writing that ever important thank you note. For the tech-savvy staff who want to host a virtual author visit (via text, audio, and / or video), there is a chapter on how to do that. The final chapter of the book is directed towards authors desiring to become part of an author event. The appendix contains a sample event fact sheet, a sample sponsor proposal and a sample evaluation form. The chapter on additional resources is wonderfully comprehensive, containing resources for finding authors, publicity and marketing, fundraising, grant writing, and presentation skills. With Langemack's book in hand, hosting your next author event will be a snap! Langemack, author of The Booktalker's Bible, is a public librarian and former coordinator of Reader's Services for the King County Library System near Seattle, WA. She has had extensive involvement with readers, writers, teachers and librarians on local, state, and national levels as a booktalker and speaker on readers' advisory topics. [Reviewed December 2007]