Penguin Imprint Focus: Interview with Rachel Kempster

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This week we kick of a series of interviews with the DK staff, where we'll try to figure out the secret to their success by asking them about their favorite childhood books and what sort of trouble they've been up to lately. Read these interviews carefully--DK's secrets are contained within!

Rachel Kempster, Associate PR Director

Okay, quick: tell us about yourself, what your favorite book was as a child, and how you ended up doing PR for DK!

My earliest book memories are of Sydney Taylor's All of a Kind Family series--my mom and I would pass them back and forth until they shredded to bits. The books were about five young sisters living on the Lower East Side, and I adored them.

How did I end up doing PR for DK? I answered a New York Times classified ad! It seems so quaint, right? But it's true. I'd dropped out of my doctoral program (I was studying 17th century transatlantic literature) and was working at a bookstore when I answered an ad to be a publicity assistant. I'll admit that at the time I had no idea what that entailed. I just knew I loved books.

How does PR for such visually based books as DK's differ from standard PR done for novels, say, or other text based works of non fiction?

It's very different, and that's the way I like it. It's rare for us to get a "real" review in The New York Times or Washington Post--so that's not our focus. We aim to get maximum exposure in every way possible from TV appearances, recipe excerpts, seasonal round-ups, mentions and author interviews. Sparingly, we tour authors. It's interesting for us, always, because the subjects of our books vary wildly. In September I'm working on the Vertigo Encyclopedia, The Modern Baker, Battle at Sea, and The Jewish Holidays Cookbooks--not a lot of subject overlap there!

Do you prefer doing PR work for adult or for children's books? How does one differ from the other?

Tough question. I have a great fondness for the kid's books because it's how I first came to know DK as a bookseller and consumer. DK's children's editorial team revolutionized kid's reference publishing with the launch of Eyewitness, and they just constantly amaze me with innovation after innovation. Working on Pick Me Up, our first kid's book to hit the New York Times Bestseller list, was definitely a career highlight. That said, I've worked with some amazing authors on the adult titles--and I'm incredibly proud of my department's achievements in promoting that list. This fall I'm thrilled to be working on Nick Malgieri's The Modern Baker in particular. It's stunning, and it makes us all crave cake!

How has the increasing importance of the Internet and digital technology affected your PR work? How is DK positioning themselves in regards to taking advantage of all this new technology?

New research and technology keeps me sharp, motivated, and constantly curious. Back in grad school, I spent a summer working part-time at the Women Writers Project, a really fascinating research project using modern technology to preserve and make accessible the writing of pre-Victorian women writers. That experience forced me to think really deeply about the relationships between authors and readers. That's so relevant to my work now--and it will never stop being relevant to anyone in this business. DK has an interesting challenge ahead of itself as open source projects like wikipedia and Encyclopedia of Life challenge reference book publishing, but I'm incredibly hopeful that the challenge will lead to tremendous innovation, and innovation is exciting.

I'm also interested and invested in finding smarter ways to work that take advantage of new technology. I started a wiki for my department, and it's been an excellent resource and reference. It's also free! I use Backpack (a nifty program from 37 Signals) to organize my tasks and calendar, and I live and die by my RSS feeds. OK, so I'm a little nerdy, but it's all really practical and helpful.

What aspects of your job do you particularly enjoy? Do you have any good stories of PR related shennanigans?

For the past three years I've represented DK on "The Today Show" to talk about our yearly donation to their toy drive. It's kind of hilarious and weird to be on TV--last year after the segment aired, my first grade teacher managed to track me down and send me an email! And it makes my mom and dad incredibly proud. And there are other fun parts of my job--hanging out with Jane Seymour in the pre-dawn hours at a TV tour, eating unbelievable food prepared by Morimoto--but mostly, I love the regular days with my department, brainstorming, solving problems, and executing campaigns.

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