Faber serenades Browning Wroe’s paperback with Waterloo chorus
Faber marked the paperback publication of Jo Browning Wroe’s A Terrible Kindness on Thursday 8th December with a performance from a male voice choir, Meantime Chorus, at London Waterloo.
Browning Wroe’s bestselling début novel follows a volunteer embalmer at Aberfan and his background as a Cambridge chorister.
One thousand chapter samplers were handed out to the public and the event was organised in partnership with W H Smith, which announced A Terrible Kindness as part of its Winter Richard and Judy Book Club earlier this week.
Browning Wroe was selected as one of the Observer’s Best Début Novelists of 2022 and the book was chosen for the Radio 2 Book Club.
The consumer activity for the paperback was launched in late November with two reading ambassador events, with a small number of the novel’s biggest fans and champions from the blogger and influencer community participating in a Q&A session with the author and receiving exclusive ambassador packs.
The long-tail campaign will continue into the new year, with National Rail outdoor posters, newsletter promotion with NetGalley and Bookshop.org, and a library book club campaign with The Reading Agency.
Hannah Marshall, head of marketing, worked with Mercedes MacMahon at Street PR on the promotional event. She said: “We wanted to do something that encapsulated the novel’s themes of generosity, healing and hope. Music and choral singing is at the heart of William Lavery’s story so hosting a choir performance for the public felt like a fitting way to launch the novel in paperback, and Waterloo station was a dream place to do it.”
Louisa Joyner, associate publisher, said: “To celebrate the paperback publication with the joy and power of a male voice choir is the perfect end to a spectacular year for Jo. There were tears when I first read this beautiful novel, a couple of welling-up moments when the novel made the bestseller charts and we heard Jo speak at the launch, and I know there were one or two more tears of joy when we were together at Waterloo, and it’s only day one of its paperback life!”
