Non-Fiction

I realize I would have to post the jpeg of his letter somewhere online before I can post a jpeg of it here, so I will just excerpt from it very briefly for now.

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First, here is what Patterson's June 2022 memoir says about the reason he approved a full page advertisement (in November 1984), in the NY Times -- which was actually a scam bait and switch ad, duping consumers, as it was a false ad for many reasons.

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From Patterson' memoir, Pages 114 and 115

"One big problem with the creative department at J. Walter Thompson was that - when I started running at least -- nobody very good wanted to work there. I doubted that we could recruit a decent porter. Thompson New York was seen as uptight, stodgy, and not very creative."

...."The reason I ran the ad was that I was desperate...."

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But here's what he wrote to me in an August 1985 letter about JWT NY recruiting efforts:

"We take great care and some pride in our recruitment program, and we have
the best reputation in the business for that reason."

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Well, you can't have it both ways in this instance - either:

a) you're "desperate" and can't recruit "a decent porter" (so: your recruitment efforts have been a failure and a disaster),

or,

b) your recruitment efforts have been a source of "pride" and you have the "best reputation" in the business for recruiting.

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In my opinion:

The true fact is that "recruitment" had nothing to do with the real reasons Patterson approved this false ad -- and promoted it for nine years to the media, resulting in an onslaught of false news stories and media in both trade publications and general media.

Getting himself media attention so he could finally get a novel of his on the NY Times Bestseller list was a big part of his motivation. And Patterson didn't mind stepping on the dreams of thousands of unsuspecting consumers to do it.

Getting this ad agency -- a publicly held company with a government client -- in a positive media light for free as often as possible, was also a big part of it. It seems to me the major hope was this media attention would create demand for the agency's depressed stock - depressed due to embezzling, is my belief.


This ad had nothing to do with finding new writers.