WHY BOOK HOOKS?
Like you, we believe in the power of new ideas. Our book events are customized to enhance the goals and directives of your organization. For years, we’ve watched our book events help:
• Build a stronger community within organizations
• Strengthen collaboration and networking among employees
• Leverage opportunities for employee growth and education
• Stimulate discussion on current events, work/life balance, leadership, management, coaching, and more.
HOW WE WORK
1. Pick the author: Our long-term relationships with large publishing houses and university presses enable us to bring exciting authors who are touring with their new books into your offices. We determine which of authors / books are a good fit for your target audience, and if you like an author who is not on tour we’ll be happy to reach out and set up an event with him or her and arrange all the details.
Planning: We start the process by working closely with a member of your staff who is committed to enhancing the work/life of your employees. Our goal is to find the best books and authors to fit your strategic needs and the interests of your organization.
2. Size doesn’t matter: Group size can range from 25 to 1500 (see our Feb. 4 event with Muhammad Yunus at GWU’s Lisner Auditorium). Just let us know what you have in mind.
3. Timing: We’ll work with your organization to structure a format that works best for you. Most authors like to talk about their books for 30-40 minutes, take questions from the audience, and then relax and chat with the audience during a book signing.
4. Fees: We offer a flat fee per event — generally without the speaker fees. Our goal is to be the most affordable provider of the best events for your organization.
Postmortem: After the big day, we traditionally conduct a post-event with your organization’s leaders to measure the impact of your success.
5. Series are Best: We recommend starting with at least four book events per year and purchasing a minimum of 50 of the author’s books for each event to provide as a gift to attendees. (If allowed, we will bring additional books so your employees can purchase more copies.)
6. Book Orders: Even if we have not planned or conducted a book event for you, we can help your organization purchase books for corporate gifts, employee training programs and book clubs. We offer competitive pricing and delivery, as well as tax-exempt sales for books delivered outside of Washington, DC. We will provide a free quote with no obligation – just email us with the title and quantity at bookorders@hooksbookevents.com.
Ready to infuse fresh new ideas into your organization? Contact us: bookhooks@hooksbookevents.com / 301-229-1128.
KNOW AHEAD LIST: 2009
The following authors are booked to come to events in the Washington, DC area in the following months. If you’d like to have them participate in an event at your company, let us know! Email Perry Hooks.
JANUARY
Jan. 7 — Jon Meacham’s American Lion: Andrew Jackson in the White House (Random House, 2008) delivers a human portrait of a pivotal president who forever changed the American presidency. Jackson, his intimate circle of friends, and his tumultuous times are at the heart of this remarkable book about the man who rose from nothing to create the modern presidency. Beloved and hated, venerated and reviled, Andrew Jackson was an orphan who fought his way to the pinnacle of power, bending the nation to his will in the cause of democracy.
Jan. 13 — Jeff Madrick’s The Case for Big Government (The Public Square) challenges us to think anew about the responsibilities that government should meet in today’s competitive global economy. He explains why politics and economics should go hand in hand; why America benefits when the government actively nourishes economic growth; and why America must reject free market orthodoxy and adopt ambitious government-centered programs.
Jan. 13 — White House Ghosts by Robert Schlesinger (Simon & Schuster, 2008) takes you into the minds and machinations of presidents in a way no other book has — through the insights of succeeding generations of White House speechwriters. As a long-time student of the American presidency, I was constantly engaged, intrigued, and amused by this very smart and ambitious book.” — Tom Brokaw, author of Boom! and The Greatest Generation
Jan. 14 — Harvard Sitkoff’s King: Pilgrimage to the Mountaintop (FSG, 2009) is described as a biography of Martin Luther King that is simultaneously concise and complex, judicious and deeply moving. Carefully presented alongside King’s successes are his failures—as an organizer in Albany, Georgia, and St. Augustine, Florida; as a leader of ever more strident activists; as a husband.
Jan. 16 — When FDR took his oath of office in March 1933, more than 10,000 banks had gone under following the Crash of 1929, a quarter of American workers were unemployed, and riots were breaking out at garbage dumps as people fought over scraps of food. In NOTHING TO FEAR: FDR’s Inner Circle and the Hundred Days that Created Modern America Adam Cohen brings to life this fulcrum moment in American history—the tense, frenzied first one hundred days, when FDR and his inner circle completely reinvented the role of the federal government. Before the Hundred Days, the federal government was limited in scope and ambition; by the end, it had assumed an active responsibility for the welfare of all of its citizens.
Jan. 29 — George Friedman’s The Next 100 Years: A Forecast for the 21st Century (Doubleday, 2009) draws on a fascinating explanation of history and geopolitical patterns dating back hundreds of years. Friedman shows that we are now, for the first time in half a millennium, at the dawn of a new historical era. He is frequently called upon as a media expert on national security, information warfare, computer security, and the intelligence business. Mr. Friedman may be available for additional events.
FEBRUARY
Feb. 4 — Muhammad Yunus’ Creating a World Without Poverty will be published in paperback (Public Affairs, 2009), and HBE will hold a public event at 7 PM that evening to hear Dr. Yunus share his vision on microlending and its impact in Bangladesh and around the world. Check www.hooksbookevents.com for updated information and ticketing on this event.
*Feb. 5 — A. Lincoln – A Biography by Ronald C. White offers a fresh and compelling definition of Lincoln as a man of integrity–what today’s commentators would call “authenticity”–whose moral compass holds the key to understanding his life. The Abraham Lincoln who comes into focus is a person of intellectual curiosity, comfortable with ambiguity, unafraid to “think anew and act anew.” This transcendent, sweeping, passionately written biography will engage a whole new generation of Americans. This is the first in a series of events commemorating the bicentennial of Lincoln’s birth.
*Feb. 10 — In Authentic Conversations: Moving from Manipulation to Truth and Commitment co-authors, Jamie and Maren Showkeir advocate authentic conversations that are based on an adult-adult model, instead of an adult-child model. In these conversations participants tell the truth, let go of the illusion of control, and view each other as in charge of their own motivation. Note, the Showkeirs have time while in DC to come to your office to discuss this important topic. Please let us know if you are interested.
*Feb. 19 — Le Deal: How An American in Business, In Love and In Over His Head Kick-Started a Multibillion Dollar Industry in Europe by J. Byrne Murphy (St. Martin’s Press, 2008) is an adventure story involving raw entrepreneurship, high-level politics, and a young American family in foreign lands. It is the true story of Byrne Murphy, a businessman who abruptly moves to Paris with his wife and baby daughter in a quest to reignite his career and his fortunes. He quickly finds himself up against strange and powerful forces for which he is ill prepared.
*Feb. 26 — Mia Bay’s To Tell the Truth Freely: The Life of Ida B. Wells (FSG, 2009) will celebrate Black History Month at TEI. Mia Bay vividly captures Wells’s childhood in Mississippi, early career in late-nineteenth-century Memphis when her fight for justice began in 1883, and later life in progressive-era Chicago. Ms. Bay will also have room on her schedule for another DC event. Perhaps your organization would like to host her in celebration of Black History Month!
MARCH
*March 3 — The Leaders We Need & What Makes Us Follow by Michael Maccoby (Harvard Press, 2007). In this unusual take on America’s leadership crisis, Maccoby calls for a new kind of leader: collaborators rather than stern bureaucrats, who are able to attract a new kind of follower. For workers in the information economy who are skeptical of father figures, he advocates relationships to bosses that are less parental and more sibling-like.
*March 11 — Ron Alsop’s The Trophy Kids Grow Up: How the Millennial Generation is Shaking Up the Workplace (Wiley, 2008) explores in depth the most salient attributes of those born between 1980 and 2001, particularly as they are playing out in the workplace. Employers are trying to integrate the most demanding and most coddled generation in history into a workplace shaped by the driven baby-boom generation. Millennials are a complex generation — hard working and achievement oriented, but most don’t excel at leadership and independent problem solving. They want the freedom and flexibility of a virtual office, but they also want rules and responsibilities to be spelled out explicitly. “It’s all about me,” might seem to be the mantra of this demanding bunch of young people, yet they also tend to be very civic-minded and philanthropic.
*March 12 — Nina Silber’s Gender and The Sectional Conflict (UNC Press, 2008) is an insightful exploration of gender relations during the Civil War. Silber compares broad ideological constructions of masculinity and femininity among Northerners and Southerners. Her investigation offers a new understanding of how Unionists and Confederates perceived their reasons for fighting, of the new attitudes and experiences that women—black and white—on both sides took up, and of the very different ways that Northern and Southern women were remembered after the war ended.
APRIL
*April 3 — Peter Sheahan’s new book Fl!p (Harper Collins, 2008) reveals what the superstars of modern business have in common – an ability to “flip” – to think counter intuitively and then act boldly; with no regard for business-as-usual conventions. The only rule – there are no rules! Sheahan provides a foundation and guidelines for developing and employing a flexible mindset – stimulating a way of thinking that will remain relevant regardless of the changes that will occur. Not yet 30 years old, he is already globally recognized as a leading expert in workforce trends and generational change. Peter will be the keynote speaker at the annual conference of the Legal Marketing Association.