I acknowledge that publicity doesn’t come naturally to me. And since I am lucky enough to be middle class, and have a little bit of money to just throw at a problem, I started looking into the effectiveness of a book publicist. So I found this article by Jane Friedman about her takeaway from a panel about book publicists.
Perhaps I have trained myself to see too many fnords – to see the unsaid but relevant things. But Friedman’s article goes on at some length about what publicists want from the writers with whom they work, but nothing about what the publicist brings to the table. What the publicist does for the writer is discussed in ONE LINE in Friedman’s article: “Publicity seeks to find, identify, or target the audience to make them aware of your book.” The rest? It is about saying how much work the author will need to do, and lowering expectations.