that purple monster

There are certain ways of NOT going about publicity.

Reputation is imperative. I noticed this with my studio... reputation is invisible, they will never tell you what they heard about you. But you will feel it, in people's attitudes and in your numbers. I'm now at the point in my violin studio where I can tell a prospective student to the face, "my fees are quite high", and they sign on anyway. Reputation pops out in small ways - strangers call in and ask for lessons, and when I tell them my name (our posters have no name on them, just numbers), they say, "aah!". (Not, "aargh!" - LOL!)

Now the best way to ruin a reputation right on the outset is to set up a truly professional, highly visible, public event - and then make an unprofessional mess of it. People remember. "Ah! Lyz Russo - that idiot woman who set up all her books here and then brought the creche to tear down the place! We couldn't eat our breakfast in peace! She and her rugrats also put us off looking at the gallery. Eww!"

I shan't set up another booksigning until the following are in place:

• a bookshop calls for it
• there have been newspaper reviews and the book is freely available
• the book is making waves

AND MOST IMPORTANTLY

• someone is babysitting - paid for the day, preferably in another city!

How is it that when a woman dumps her children on her husband in an important professional event, they feel sorry for the man and they regard her as a selfish, inept mother? But when a father dumps his children on his wife while she's busy with an important professional event, onlookers feel sorry for him and regard her as an inept professional and a selfish woman who is an inept mother and wife?

I can see why behind every successful man there is a very active wife -
behind every successful woman there's a broken marriage!