Lady RaRa's Rules for Self-Promotion

RYAN SUKRITE: Hello, Publishing! This is Ryan Sukrite, reporting live for BookTV from the red welcome mat at BEA. Oh, look, here's superpublicist and bestselling author Lady RaRa arriving in her hot pink limo! She's the guest of honor at this year's event, and doesn't she look amazing in that razor-spiked g-string made out of rejection form postcards? She's spelled out "Not for us" in diamonds just below her navel, how clever! Let's see if I can get an on-the-spot interview. (charges limo) Lady RaRa? Lady RaRa!

LADY RARA: (climbs out of limo) No autographs. No kissing. No touching.

SUKRITE: Lady RaRa, It's me, Ryan Sukrite from BookTV. You look utterly fabulous!

RARA: Thank you, Bryan. I am feeling very fabulous today. This is because I am looking fabulous, thanks to my favorite designer, Armand Aleg. He made my jacket from shredded unsolicited submissions. (lifts paper sleeve) I'm calling it slushpile recycled chic.

SUKRITE: What a great way to go green and get rid of some unread, unwanted manuscripts, Lady! And by the way, it's Ryan, not Bryan. So tell us, what are you going to talk about during the big luncheon?

RARA: Oh, you know, Ronald, my rules for self-promotion, and what all these book writers must do to be a little more fabulous. (laughs) What am I saying, writers are not at all fabulous. They are fat smelly people with very bad hair and yellow teeth. But they could be so much more if they would just promote themselves as Lady RaRa does.

SUKRITE: Fascinating! Especially now that authors already do so much to promote themselves. Do you believe that they're doing it wrong? And my name is Ryan.

RARA: (shrugs) The Twitter, the Facebook, that is so yesterday. They must be more unique, more fashionable, more like me. Without copying me, of course. You copy my promotion designs, then my attorney will be calling.

SUKRITE: Can you give our viewers an example of how they can accompish that? And call me Ryan, please.

RARA: Well, Robin, at my last book signing, I used a hot pink sequinned pen filled with my own blood. And I let the store manager caress my bubbies while I gave my reading.

SUKRITE: How daring! I wish my name were Robin, but it's Ryan. That signing in blood idea sounds as if it would work really well for a vampire fiction writer.

RARA: (nods) It would if I hadn't trademarked it, Colin, so they can't use that. But they could make their appearance more fabulous. Like by putting little rubies all over their face. With superglue. It also covers up all those pimples they have.

SUKRITE: Look, it's Ryan, not Colin. Wouldn't covering someone's face with rubies be extremely expensive?

RARA: That is why God created third mortgages, Tyrone. I am authentic, so I use only real gems on my face. Diamonds, not rubies, of course. And writers should sleep with their editors whenever possible.

SUKRITE: My name is Ryan. R-Y-A-N. But what if the writer and editor are both women? Should they still sleep together?

RARA: (giggles) They shouldn't sleep, Richard! And what is hotter than girl-on-girl action? Make a film of it and post it on YouTube, and in a week their book will be number two on the Times list. Mine will still be at number one, naturally.

SUKRITE: Say Ryan. Just once. I'm begging you.

RARA: No begging, no kissing, no touching. (waggles fingers at camera) Tah-tah, darlings. (saunters off, leaving a trail of submission letter shreds.)

SUKRITE: (under his breath) Bitch. (turns to camera) There you have it, viewers. Superglue some rubies over your acne, sleep with your editor, and sign your books in your own blood, and maybe you too can become as fabulous as New York Times #1 bestseller, Lady RaRa!