Join CLMP for a session with marketing and publicity professionals, who will share low- and no-cost strategies for literary presses looking to build community, expand their audience, and effectively promote their titles.
Speakers:
Amelia Possanza is the co-founder of Lavender Public Relations. She loves working with debut novelists, fiction writers who bring a fresh voice and perspective to their work, and memoirists, as well as literary organizations. She has worked with a number of small presses during her time as a freelance publicist, including Dorothy, Noemi, Amble, and Read Furiously. Prior to going freelance, she worked at Flatiron Books on campaigns for books by Elliot Page, Melinda French Gates, Angie Cruz, Charlotte McConaghy, and more. She is also the author of the nonfiction book Lesbian Love Story: A Memoir in Archives, winner of a Lambda Literary Award.
Andrea Jo DeWerd is a book marketing strategist, consultant, writer, speaker, and the founder of the future of agency LLC, a full-service book marketing agency that supports everyone from Big 5 and hybrid published authors to indie presses. A 14-year veteran of Big 5 publishing with 105+ NYT bestsellers, most recently at HarperCollins, Andrea’s experience ranges from commercial (Mary Higgins Clark) and literary fiction (Elizabeth Strout) and memoir (Educated by Tara Westover) and narrative nonfiction (former Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch) to health and wellness (Dr. Uma Naidoo), business books (Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff), cookbooks (South of Somewhere), and bestselling lifestyle brands (The Whole 30).
Brittani Hilles is the co-founder of Lavender Public Relations, a boutique literary publicity firm with a focus on queer and feminist authors. She has over a decade worth of book publicity experience developing standout campaigns for authors across all genres, with a speciality in fiction. Previous projects have included books in mystery and suspense, historical fiction, debut novels, romance, and children’s fiction. She has previously held posts at St. Martin’s Press, Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill, and William Morrow/HarperCollins.
Nadxieli Nieto is an editor of literary and upmarket fiction, select nonfiction, and art books, including NYT bestseller and Reese’s Book Club pick LA Weather; 2022 Lambda Literary Award finalist My Government Means to Kill Me, Shirley Jackson Award finalists Tiny Nightmares and Tiny Crimes, BCN award-winning Carteles Contra Una Guerra, and others. She is editorial director of Algonquin Books. Prior to joining Algonquin, she was an executive editor at Flatiron Books, where her authors included Kaitlyn Greenidge, Manuel Gonzales, Rasheed Newson, María Amparo Escandón, John Manuel Arias, Jessica Hoppe, Monica Brashears, Jean Grae, Wendy Chin-Tanner, Erica Berry, Ben Austen, Marielena Hincapie, and others. She is the former director of PEN America’s Literary Awards and is on the advisory board of Latinx in Publishing.
Automated closed captioning will be available for this event. If you have other accessibility requests, please contact [email protected]. The event will be recorded and archived in the CLMP Resource Library.
