Obviously he charges more… he drives a Ferrari! - Katherine Roberts
A friend told me this story recently. I don’t remember the details so I've made some of them up, but it came about that Fairly Famous Author visited a school. She met Famous Author on her way out, and discovered (by embarrassing accident) that he was getting paid around ten times what she was getting paid to talk to the same children. Upon questioning this with the school, she was told to look in the car park. Puzzled, she did so... parked beside her small economical car, surrounded by an admiring gang of pupils, was a bright red Ferrari. “Of course he has to charge more,” said the school secretary. “He drives a Ferrari!” Now, this story stuck with me for two reasons. First of all because it says a lot about the fame business – be it authors, footballers, singers, artists, or chefs – and secondly because it says a lot about me. Before you ask, I am not Fairly Famous Author in the above story, although I could easily have been. I too have done talks in school...