On the Road With the PRH Speakers Bureau!
2025 is in full swing for the Penguin Random House Speakers Bureau (PRHSB), and as we look at the first three months of the year, we have already sent 95 speakers to over 180 events in 39 states….and to Australia!
Let us take you behind the scenes and share how our speakers and their work are making an impact across the country.
Cat Bohannon at Pittsburgh Arts & Lectures
Cat Bohannon speaking as part of “Ten Evenings Lecture Series” (Photo Credit: Renee Rosensteel)
Pittsburgh Arts & Lectures was launched in 1991. The series aims to connect celebrated authors with the community and now presents five signature series while also partnering with local schools and non-profit organizations to maximize the impact of visiting authors to the region. PRHSB has been working with the series since 2007, and it continues to be a wonderful opportunity for our speakers.
Cat Bohannon with Gretchen Baker (Director of Carnegie Museum of Natural History) and Sony Ton-Aime (New Director at Pittsburgh Arts and Lectures) (Photo Credit: Renee Rosensteel)
This year, Senior Agent Director Madeleine Denman worked with Pittsburgh Arts & Lectures on their “Ten Evenings Lecture Series,” helping them to secure PRHSB speakers Cat Bohannon and Percival Everett for the series. In March 2025, PRHSB speaker Cat Bohannon spoke to over 800 community members (and avid fans who traveled from North Carolina and Utah!) in Pittsburgh’s stunning Carnegie Music Hall. Cat shared insights and stories from her groundbreaking New York Times bestseller EVE: How the Female Body Drove 200 Million Years of Evolution.
Feedback from the client was wonderful:
“First of all, I want to share how ecstatic we all are here after Cat’s lecture. This was a lecture that will be remembered for years! Cat is a force and exactly what we needed yesterday. She was funny, insightful, and most importantly, generous. We had people traveling from North Carolina and Utah to see her last night and they came afterwards to tell us how worth it, it all was. We gained some longtime patrons after last night. We cannot thank you enough.” —Pittsburgh Arts & Lectures
Javier Zamora at Literary Arts in Portland
After nearly 20 years in the business, PRHSB is especially happy when bookings come in from repeat clients. Literary Arts Inc., the nonprofit literary organization behind the Portland Book Festival, is one of these loyal clients that the Speakers Bureau has worked with since 2008.
In March 2024, Literary Arts started working with Senior Agent Director Kaley Baron and Associate Emily Lawrence to bring Javier Zamora in as their 2025 featured author for their community reading program, “Everybody Reads” in collaboration with Multnomah County Library and The Library Foundation. The program selected Javier’s SOLITO, and in collaboration with PRHSB’s book sales manager Eric Bliss, Multnomah County Library distributed 8,200 free custom print editions of the book, including 1,200 copies in Spanish. Over 8,000 no-wait e-books and audiobooks were downloaded as well. And after a year of planning, Javier visited Portland in March 2025 for a day of school readings and a sold-out evening event.
Javier Zamora in conversation with Eduardo Arizaga, Community Engagement Manager at Multnomah County Library (Photo credit: Shawnte Sims)
Asked about Javier’s visits to local schools, the client had this say: “The school visits at Roosevelt and McDaniel were amazing. It was wonderful for the students to be able to ask questions in Spanish, and he generously answered in Spanish and translated to English. These community engagement visits in particular are so important to our work, and we’re so appreciative of the care and time.”
You can hear the NPR interview about his school visits here.
In the evening Javier spoke at a sold-out event with 2,000 attendees, including over 500 middle and high school students who received free tickets from Literary Arts, and the client shared more great feedback with us:
“The energy and engagement of the crowd was fantastic, and his talk was powerful, thoughtful, and personal. It was one of the best I’ve heard in this program, and I feel so honored for the opportunity to share his story and his words with so many people here in Multnomah County.”
Bo Seo at World 50
Beyond the library and literary events featured, the Speakers Bureau has close and long-lasting relationships to corporations, associations, and event planners across industries. One such client is the World 50 Group, an exclusive membership company for senior executives from global organizations (including companies such as Google, Baidu, and Dutch Royal Shell) that hosts numerous events throughout the year.
Bo Seo speaking at the World 50 Customer Experience and Revenue Summit (Photo Credit: Tad Mask)
Bo Seo, a PRHSB-speaker, two-time world champion debater, and the author of GOOD ARGUMENTS has so impressed the World50 audience, that the client has worked with Agent Director Alysyn Reinhart on four bookings! Bo’s message resonates across business functions, and he has spoken to different audiences, including Management and Leadership, Chief Communications and Corporate Affairs Officers, Chief Customer Experience and Chief Revenue Officers, and Chief Marketing Officers. The event has also served as a platform to reach new clients. Bo has an event coming up to speak to the corporate communications team at U.S. Steel—a direct result of the client hearing Bo speak at World50.
Asked about Bo’s talks, the World50 team got straight to the point: “Fantastic – articulate (as expected), and responsive to audience needs.” And following an event with their Communications 50 Summit, the client had more positive feedback to share: “Our audience was so appreciative of how thoughtful Bo was in his responses and insight, and the practicality of his advice in both professional and personal contexts.