TurnHere Launches Site with Simon & Schuster

TurnHere’s branching out beyond local, beyond travel, beyond real estate with the launch of BookVideos.tv, a collaboration between the video marketing firm and book publisher Simon & Schuster. The site acts as a hub for short clips featuring authors and promotions of the company’s titles.

You can check out a video promoting a new book/movie title, “Casanegra,” by Steven Barnes and Tananarive Due. The companion flick stars Blair Underwood, who speaks with the authors about the origins of the book, focusing quite a bit on the star’s decision to buy the rights to it and produce a film in conjunction with the book. (Did I mention Underwood stars in the movie?)

Another mini-film features James W. Loewe, author of a book I recall reading years ago, “Lies My Teacher Told Me.” His new one is “Lies My Country Told Me,” and in the short film he tells the story of one James Jackson, a Virginian with a questionable confederate past.

Videos are categorized under headings including cooking, children’s, erotica, history, literary fiction, mystery and others. Site visitors can add comments, email or embed the video on another site, or — duh — click to buy the book. The site also allows people to create their own blogs centered around books, segments or authors they dig. TurnHere also distributes the videos through various channels.