Fans tuning in to the season three premiere of Justified Tuesday night, may have gotten wind of a kind of tie-in, but not quite, that HarperCollins is pushing...hard. The publisher has just released Raylan, a new novel by Elmore Leonard that grew out of the success of the F/X show which, itself, is based on a character that originally appeared in a short story by the author. That the second season of Justified borrowed heavily from Raylan, with the show's writers cribbing from Leonard's book when it was still in manuscript form, makes the cross-promotion that much easier for the publisher.
HC acquired Raylan in the summer of 2011 and has packaged the new book with an image of the show's star, Timothy Olyphant, splashed prominently (and singularly) on its cover. HC has also reissued, and renamed, the anthology that included "Fire in the Hole," the story in which Raylan Givens, a sharp-shooting Kentucky U.S. Marshal with a deeper appreciation of justice than the letter of the law, first appeared. The new HC edition, now called Fire In the Hole, has a cover burst referencing the TV show, and was published on January 3. (The collection was originally called When the Women Come Out to Dance, and was published by HC's William Morrow imprint in 2002.) Marketing-wise, HC has placed ads for Raylan on the DVDs of season two of the show, as well as on Tuesday's premiere of season three.
Olyphant and the show's creator, Graham Yost, are also helping Leonard with some of his publicity. Tuesday night, at the Paley Center, the two appeared alongside Leonard on a panel promoting the book. The men are also pushing the book with Leonard in forthcoming pieces on NPR's Talk of the Nation, as well as in, among others, USA Today and The New York Times. Among HC's other tie-in efforts are a promotional video for the new book, up on Amazon, featuring clips from the show and an interview with Leonard. HC has done an announced first printing of 150,000 for Raylan.
