murder.booklocker.com

Just found a great idea on how to do a talk at a library, although I assume it would work nearly anywhere. Author Henry Kisor used a digital projector to show a PowerPoint presentation which included scenic photos of the area in which his mysteries are set. Between his remarks, his wife read from the book! Henry says:

“Perhaps, also, bookstore and library audiences are ripe to be plucked in this way. Readers may be text-driven people, but eye candy very likely adds a novel (ahem!) dimension to the usual author’s talk. Naturally the backgrounds to my pitches include Lake Superior sunsets as well as photos of wolves and deer, geese and mergansers, shipwrecks and abandoned mines.”

Sounds like a winner to me!

We were talking last night about how this might be implemented for PARK RIDGE. It was hard enough to come up with ideas for the book trailer! This is what I’ve come up with so far.

• an outside shot of the Park Ridge Senior Center - after all it is a REAL place! [Would it make sense to include other photos of Park Ridge? Like the police station or city hall or the Pickwick Theatre? St. Juliana's in Edison Park figures pretty strongly in one of the chapters.]
• a shot of the Rec Area of the Center where folks play cards - Hey! It’s a book about four pinochle players
• billiards room - scene of the first murder
• the cowboy vest and Stetson I used for the trailer
• ????

Kisor mentioned having his wife read portions of the book. What parts would I want read - with what pictures? There’s a good passage of description of Stan that would work with the vest and cowboy hat. The Easter passage would work with St. Juliana’s. And I’ve read Chapter Two, the first murder, at two libraries already. That’s the one that takes place in the billiards room.

Hmm, maybe this won’t be too hard after all.