union discounts on all of our books. >> and because we have a progressive president of the baltimore city council as of the last election, if you want to buy this book for a new city council people and give it to them will give you a bigger counsel, 30% off. >> we need more independent bookstores to build on this model. i just want to say that this is creative marketing. very author friendly. and thank you for coming. >> thank you for hosting for being here. [applause]

>> the author james patterson, i think i read someone where was told by someone who knows this that one and 36 books in the united states has your name on it. >> i hear these things, but fake news, i don't pay attention. >> there's a lot of people who like my books which is terrific for me, and especially people going into bookstores. >> how many books are you working on right now. >> usually a dozen or so books that i'm doing at one time. last year, i worked two books by myself and i wrote 2500 pages of outline/year and all my outlines

are three or four drafts. so three or four drafts of a 2500 page whatever. it's all just making up stories. here's a story and here's how i see the story going. we have a book that i'm doing with president, bill clinton. >> you've done the outline? >> yes, we're halfway through. we frequently talk on the phone a lot. scrape. he's a storyteller to enhance information about the presidency and the government that other people do not have. [inaudible] what is the first rafter? are you the first rafter is he? >> i'm not entirely sure now that's work. >> when is it do? >> next summer a long time ago, piece of it was when i was

growing up my grandparents had a small restaurant in upstate new york. the cook was a black woman named laura. she was having problems with her husband and they said will move in with us and she moved in with us for about three years. during that time, i spent time with her family they were smart, funny, interesting and the food was wonderful and i actually prefer being with her family the mile. that stuck with me in terms of a working, with her family so that's especially where nana mama came from. that gets to be a combination of this woman and my grandmother. who is one of these people who

would go up on television when she was 80 years old. literally up three stories a new sale my gosh,. >> that's not how she died. >> the children book thing, when we have a son jack was 19 now. when he was little, he's a very bright kid, he was not a big reader. when he was eight i have been stimulated to write books for kids because people turn the pages that's useful for kids to get them of all. but when jack he wasn't a big reader and that summer and i wish more people would do this, we told him he had to read every day and we told him that he had to unless he wanted to live in

the garage. we got about a dozen books, some at the leibrandt summit bookstores and by the end of the summer he read all 12 and his reasoning scores were crazy and he took his act's now and he got a perfect score in reading. the kids will become good readers if they read enough, most kids. parents need to take responsibility for that. they need to understand that it's their job, in the same way that you teach your boy how to throw a baseball, or your girl how to write a bike but getting them to read is even more important. >> prior to becoming an author you had a life. >> guest: i was in advertising for several years. i've been clean for over 20 years now. it got me to understand communication better.

it got me to understand there is an audience, that you going to talk to people and you have to hold their attention and they're not necessarily interested in what you have to say. i think that's important with children's books. >> the first manuscript you wrote, what was it? >> guest: the first book i wrote was i was 25. i went to graduate school and i wrote a detective novel turned down by 31 publishers. it then was bought by little brown and it won an edgar. so go figure, turned on by 31 publishers and then it wins an egg reward. so, for anybody who is writing, you can get turned down because sometimes are not paying enough attention, where i don't know whatever it is.

>> i left for a while and came back. so i've been with them in total over 25 years. it's been a nice relationship. >> you have another nonfiction book that you're working on, where did this come from. >> guest: i wrote murder king tut, that i wrote -- rich which is about a guy ran into in palm beach, billionaire who is accused of having relationships with several underage girls. i'm doing one right now and aaron hernandez. i think it's a fascinating story. we have a lot of insider information in terms of what went on at the university of florida by his family, i don't want to offend anybody but it's

the fact that when you get somebody who had not just a physical gift but he was a bright guy, he was making it in a big way and just signed a contract and yet something was wrong about this guy. some of it goes back to his father died very unexpectedly when aaron was 16 and something happen. one so it's a story that i have in my head and think it's going to be a terrific story. >> host: ross identify you as a literacy advocate. >> yes. we just do a lot. my wife and, we have scholarships for teachers or people who are studying to be

teachers and i think 30 universities. we have over 450 scholarships to teachers. that's one thing. i will do graduation speeches, i did it at manhattan college, mississippi state, we have programs for the scholastic that we gave away almost 2 million to school libraries last year. this year will do classroom libraries which is even cooler, because a lot of times these teachers are putting up their own money to buy books for the classrooms. so so far, and ten days we get 20000 teachers saying please help our classroom. we do a thing in the holidays where we give out bonuses to people who work in bookstores around the country. and in a lot of ways that's the

most gratifying because they always write letters and there always articulate and emotional. with a lot of these people they don't have much money. so all the sudden $1500 or thousand dollars comes out of the sky. and that means somebody can go to the dentist this year, that's the reality. a lot of people working in bookstores there's not any money there. so that's a rewarding program. there's other things that we do. >> host: how anonymous can you be these days walking on the street. >> it's not bad. it's not like you're tom hanks or tom cruz, nicole kidman. people will notice or maybe smile,. >> your little more because it's full of bookstores. but a lot of them we helped out and they say on such and such from this place and you give us a gram. and that's very emotional and

they want to meet us which is very gratifying and fun. >> james, author and literary advocate. author of over 150 books, thrillers, romances, young adults. 350 million bucks as of january 2016. . . it's smart we to.

if we can get book thursday kids' hands, will go a long way in the country in terms of making this country more compassionate, more thoughtful, a little less of a -- a little better judgment when we're dealing with the political process, et cetera, et cetera. >> thank you for being on booktv. >> yeah. [inaudible conversations] >> good afternoon. i'm a senior fellow at the hoover institution and the codirector at the center for international security cooperation here at stands are. we're delighted both institutions have come together to co-host this become event