Once upon a time, soon after I’d left the protective walls of my single-sex college in New England, I became a publicist in Manhattan. I worked for a high profile, multinational company that boasted several different divisions. My client list included a major candy company, a family friendly cruise line and a podiatrist who wanted to give Dr. Scholl’s a run for his money. I hated my job but I learned a lot about running a successful publicity campaign. Almost twenty years later I’m reaching back to my publicist years for inspiration and guidance to plan my book tour for Substitute Me. Since Substitute Me is my third book, I’m not a complete novice, but it is my first novel so the venues I can approach – either for publicity purposes or as a signing spot – are a little different. In addition, with a non-fiction title, there’s a presumption of a news hook or at least there was with the books I wrote. With Substitute Me however, my basic pitch is that this is just a really good story. So I have to get creative with my venues. What’s more, considering the fact that a lot of the chain bookstores are as hard to break into as Fort Knox, it makes even more sense to try some alternatives to the bookstore for hosting my events. Here’s what I’ve come up with so far. First I concentrated on defining my target audience. Women. Break that down to women with children who might have some insight or opinions on nannies. And of course, I included women who are nannies or might have once been a nanny. Not to mention that woman we all love, the one who loves to read good novels about other women. So I asked myself, where do these women hang out? One idea that popped into my head was a local indoor playground that is outfitted with free wi-fi, a café and plenty of tables and chairs for grown-ups, a.k.a. a rapt audience for a book reading. I pitched the idea to the manager of the playground and not only did she like the idea, she thought it would be a great way to increase traffic on a weeknight when business was usually slow. So moms can come to a book event, the kids can play, and the business owner can ply all the visitors with her cookies and juice boxes. Everybody’s happy and I’ve reached one segment of my target audience. Some of the other alternative venues where I’m thinking about trying to have an event are home stores like IKEA and Pottery Barn. They both show up in the book and I’m hoping store managers might like the idea. They might not but it’s worth a shot. I’m also approaching a few churches because I’ve discovered some churches have their own internal book clubs. And the other alternative venue I’m going to try, one that worked for my first book, Hair Story – for obvious reasons – is the hair salon. Rapt audience of women, nothing to do, usually cash on hand. Of course it is hard to be heard over the hum of a blow dryer, but I’ll still try. What about you She Writers? Besides the bookstore, what other venues have you held a book signing or event?