UnreAwarding

This is another "sigh" column.

I guess since I don't think that the publishing industry has really figured out marketing/promotion for the majority of its books,  I shouldn't be surprised that it can't figure out marketing/promotion for its awards.

The coverage of the mystery/suspense awards at Bouchercon two weeks ago was dismal. No newspaper coverage and not even coverage in all the main industry blogs. Yes, there were a lot of awards given out at B'con - but not even the biggest - The Anthony  - got any substantive press.

Then two nights ago the Quills were held. The coverage was slightly better. They got a single short paragraph in the NYT! (but it only mentioned one winner), an AP story about how the show lacked focus and what went wrong, and a story in PW - whose parent company sponsors the awards.

I would have imagined that with the cost of that award show and the categories it covers and the celebs attending and the goal - to get more national attention for  books -it would have fared better. (I'm not going to argue the merits of the Quills - rewarding books because they were bestsellers - or argue the merits of naming a 21st century award after a 16th century writing instrument). The point is if Caroline Kennedy hadn't showed up, I wonder if it would have gotten any press at all?

The National Book Awards will do better since even their short list got a longer graph in the Times than the total Quill story. And there's a list of articles on the short list reactions here.

The Booker did and always does okay, the winner of the fiction award got a profile asap,  and all the major industry mags/blogs mentioned it and we know there will be many interviews and profiles in the next week. But the Booker has a lot of money behind it in prizes and it's British and  has a certain cachet we can't manage to muster.

Regardless of amount of press any of them get, we still  hear every year how  awards don't seem to motivate readers.

So what's an industry to do?

Well clearly trying to mimic Hollywood isn't going to cut it. (The Quills were first presented as an effort to do a Oscar show crossed with People's Choice awards).

But movies are not books.

Authors are not movie stars.

When one of us gets drunk and bashes a minority group it doesn't make TV. It makes a blog read by 191 people.

We have to  solve our PR publicity problems by being bold and fearless and doing something different.
We have got to  stop put on scuba diving suits to climb a mountain because the scuba divers are doing successful with the gear they have and the job they do.

Comments

[Ali]

Yes I know, this is a bummer.

In the UK we do have the Nibbies, The Richard and Judy Awards [think Oprah Winfrey] - anyway at Shots we do pass the news out

http://www.shotsmag.co.uk/latestnews/latest.html

Covering all the major awards

Ali
www.shotsmag.co.uk