The New York Times will serialize four "great books" in the New York market over the next two months, in a new book promotion called "The Great Summer Read." It will launch on July 12 with The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald (Scribner), followed by Truman Capote's Breakfast at Tiffany's (Modern Library/Vintage) on July 26; Laura Esquivel's Like Water for Chocolate (Anchor) on August 9; and James McBride's The Color of Water (Riverhead) on August 23.
Each book will be published in its entirety, in seven installments that will begin on a Monday and culminate the following Sunday. The daily excerpts will appear in a 16-page newsprint supplement similar to the New York Times Book Review, though typeset in a slightly larger font and without illustrations.
For the Times, which sees itself as "a natural advocate for fostering literacy and a passion for reading," the program is a way to reward its current readers and perhaps draw new ones, said marketing v-p Alyse Myers.
But why would a publisher all but give away copies of a major backlist title? "We're banking on the fact that exposure reminds people about great literature," Scribner publisher Susan Moldow told PW. "In 1952, Life magazine ran the entire text of The Old Man and Sea and it went on to be Hemingway's biggest success. The "Look Inside the Book" program at Amazon has also proven that if people can read part of a book, they're more likely to read the whole thing. Besides, who's going to save all those old Times inserts?"
In exchange for licensing serial rights to the Times, the four publishers will each get seven full-page, four-color ads in the supplements devoted to their books. They may also benefit from local radio and TV spots about the promotion, as well as the Times's own house ads.
In addition, the newspaper's marketing services department has arranged for a conversation with a Fitzgerald expert and a call-in discussion about The Great Gatsby to air on NPR affiliate WNYC. If all goes well, host Brian Lehrer may undertake similar discussions for the other books in the series.
Finally, Borders has agreed to promote the selections by giving away installments and bookmarks, creating window displays and hosting events in their 38 stores in the New York City metropolitan region.
Though Random House senior v-p Stuart Applebaum expressed "delight" that two of the four selections come from the company's imprints, he added, "We're all curious to see the impact on retail sales of the chosen books and other books by these authors."
For Modern Library, the promotion may help draw attention to the release of two new Capote titles in September, on what would have been the author's 80th birthday: The Complete Short Stories of Truman Capote and Too Brief a Treat: The Letters of Truman Capote, edited by Gerald Clarke.
Vintage/Anchor publicity v-p Russell Perreault sees a strong possibility that the promotion could have a halo effect on other media. "Anything the New York Times does has a national impact," he said.
