Big Doings for UMass Press Debut

by Lynn Andriani -- Publishers Weekly, 4/30/2007

In June, the University of Massachusetts Press will publish Carole O'Malley Gaunt's memoir, Hungry Hill. Gaunt's route to publication may be unremarkable—unable to find a literary agent, the 60-something Massachusetts native went local—but what's happened now certainly isn't: Hungry Hill has garnered a blurb from Frank McCourt, a feature in Vogue and a limited-edition run of a handbag designed especially for the author by French accessories maker Etienne Aigner, based on a reference in the book.

The McCourt blurb came easily enough: Gaunt had taken a writing course taught by the author at the Southampton Writers Conference (now the Stony Brook Southampton Writers Conference). The Vogue feature, set for June, came through Gaunt's connection to Vogue writer Valerie Steiker, who attended the same Manhattan girls' school as Gaunt's daughters.

But the most unusual promotional hook connected to Hungry Hill is the limited edition run of the Aigner handbag. Gaunt spends about two pages describing how, in the summer of 1962, she longed for the purse, which "every cool girl" had, but she couldn't afford. Gaunt contacted Aigner for information and because she wanted to refer to the bag in her book, the company brought it back into production, and an as-yet-undetermined number of the "Carole" bags will go on sale later this year.

Gaunt admitted the bag is "not really what the book is about," but she was happy for "anything that will get people to read the book."