One of the most nerve racking things we can do as writers is the interview. We’re worried about looking dumb, saying something stupid or not being interesting or famous enough to draw an audience. Unfortunately, the interview is one of those necessary PR practices that helps get our books out there and bought.
The most nerve racking kind of interview is the face to face televised media one. Now that’s scarey! At the Perth’s writers festival, I went to a fun workshop about what NOT TO DO in an interview – especially one like this. The workshop was run by a writer and a publicist and it was particularly engaging because they illustrated their message with a role play.
The author came out and pretended to be interviewed by the publicist. Her hair was a mess, her clothes untidy and when thanked for taking time out to talk to “The Readers Association of WA,” she blanched saying, “Really, I thought was meeting with the Writers Association of WA. How weird.“
The interview degenerated from there. When the publicist asked pertinent questions about the author’s book, she answered with, “Well, have you bloody read it or not.” To the rest, she gave monosyllables, consisting of, “Yes,”, “No” and “No comment.” What she did seem to gabbit on about a lot was her personal life. She gave the interviewer a lot of information that they really didn’t need or make her look good. Eg. Her extramarital affair and her desire to quit smoking. She slouched in her chair, spoke badly about her publisher and also criticized her agent. And not once during the whole conversation did she mention the title of her book. It was the worst interview in the history of writing and one of the funniest demonstrations I’ve ever seen.
The presentation was concluded with some hot tips for what you should do:
Prepare
Practice
Research your interviewer
Have a glass of water handy.
Always mention the name of the book you’re promoting at least twice.
And finally, don’t babble.

On that note, I’ll sign off. Have a great weekend.

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