I’m all for authors being proactive in marketing their books. I’m all for determination, dedication, and even a bit of fanaticism. But this is just ridiculous.
Galleycat points out a report about Bill Schneider’s Oprah Book Club lie. Scheider, an administrative director of tourism in Provincetown, wrote a book entitled Crossed Paths. Galleycat reports the book was self-published. Fine.
But then, he went on his website and claimed the book had been selected for Oprah’s book club. And then, he went one massive step further. He even forged an interview transcript complete with stage directions and commercial breaks of his supposed interview with Oprah.
Oprah spokespeople said, “He is misrepresenting himself and he has no relationship with Oprah’s Book Club.” Schneider admitted the hoax. “I acknowledge an error in judgment,” he said.
Yet another literary hoax. And this one is so bad, in that it’s such an easy lie to disprove, that I just have to wonder what this guy was thinking? Oprah fans are fervent in their dedication. And it’s not hard to check the Oprah Book Club Selections. So how in the hell did this guy think he would get away with this?
The energy spent concocting this deception might have been better employed elsewhere.
man, I knew somebody was going to beat me to this. now I”ll have to have pretend to have been a Dr Phil guest or something.
maybe he didn’t think he was going to get away with it but knew it would generate a lot of publicity and be mentioned throughout the literary blog/internet world…. like it has been here… I don’t think that ‘no publicity is bad publicity’ but maybe this guy does… an equivalent of flaming in an internet discussion forum, just to get a reaction…
You might be right. I have friends in Hollywood who say that film producers will often sign a troubled star like Lindsay Lohan specifically for the fact that her ability to get into the headlines and tabloids guarantee a mention of the film for months.
Although, Oprah fans are so dedicated, that they most assuredly would band together to not but the book simply because of his underhanded ploy.
So I’m not sure who he thought was going to be enticed by this crazy strategy. Oh well, it gives us something to chat about, I suppose.