Publishers Lunchtag:www.publishersmarketplace.com,2008-06-12:/lunch/free//42008-06-30T15:16:26ZPublishers Lunch is the industry's "daily essential read," now shared with well over 13,000 publishing people every day. Each report gathers together stories from all over the web and print of interest to the professional trade book community, along with original reporting, plus a little perspective and the occasional wisecrack added in.Publishers MarketplacePeopletag:www.publishersmarketplace.com,2010:/lunch//2.63372010-03-19T15:32:13Z2010-03-19T15:32:45ZMelissa Possick will become associate publisher for Random House Trade Paperbacks on April 5, reporting to Jane von Mehren, as...Publishers Lunch
Melissa Possick will become associate publisher for Random House Trade Paperbacks on April 5, reporting to Jane von Mehren, as Kim Hovey focuses full-time on her role as associate publisher for Ballantine. Possick, who began her career at Random House, is currently director of marketing at Workman.
Katy Hershberger has been promoted to senior publicist at St. Martin's.]]>
People, Awards, Distribution and More Announcementstag:www.publishersmarketplace.com,2010:/lunch//2.63332010-03-18T01:56:04Z2010-03-18T02:12:39ZMatt Martz has been promoted to associate editor at St. Martin's, continuing to report to Kelley Ragland, editorial director of...Publishers Lunch
Matt Martz has been promoted to associate editor at St. Martin's, continuing to report to Kelley Ragland, editorial director of Minotaur.
Brigid Pasulka won the Hemingway Foundation/PEN Award for her debut novel A LONG LONG TIME AGO & ESSENTIALLY TRUE.
Columbia University awarded the Bancroft history prize to three books: Linda Gordon's Dorothea Lange: A Life Beyond Limits; Woody Holton's Abigail Adams; and Margaret Jacobs's White Mother to a Dark Race: Settler Colonialism, Maternalism, and the Removal of Indigenous Children in the American West and Australia, 1880-1940.
Penguin Children's announced a one-million-copy first printing for the May release of John Grisham's children's book THEODORE BOONE: Kid Lawyer, along with releasing the cover.
Ingram Publisher Services will distribute a variety of imprints from music publisher Omnibus Press, including Omnibus, Schirmer Trade Books, Bobcat Books, Vision On Publishing, Gramophone Publications and Rogan House.
EBSCO has agreed to purchase the assets of OCLC's NetLibrary division, including its Boulder, CO operations, along with the rights to license a select number of vendor-owned databases currently available through the OCLC FirstSearch service. Announcement
The Internet Archive has announced the soft launch of their new version of the Open Library. New site Blog post]]>
New BEA Program will Connect Authors to Readers Across NYCtag:www.publishersmarketplace.com,2010:/lunch//2.63292010-03-17T15:02:36Z2010-03-17T15:03:42ZBEA officially announced their plans for the "New York Book Week" concept that has been under formulation for some time,...Publishers Lunch Participating authors already include Lee Child, Jonathan Franzen, Ira Glass, Sara Gruen, David Means, Edmund Morris and Scott Turow. And partner organizations and venues so far include Times Talks, the 92nd Street Y, The New York Public Library, The Brooklyn Public Library, Symphony Space, Barnes & Noble and selected member stores of IBNYC (Independent Booksellers of New York City) including Housing Works, PowerHouse Arena and Book Culture. BEA info page]]>
People, Etc.tag:www.publishersmarketplace.com,2010:/lunch//2.63282010-03-17T14:06:23Z2010-03-17T14:07:15ZSally van Haitsma has formed her own agency, van Haitsma Literary, after six years at the Castiglia Literary Agency and,...Publishers Lunch
Sally van Haitsma has formed her own agency, van Haitsma Literary, after six years at the Castiglia Literary Agency and, before that, the Sandra Dijkstra Literary Agency. She represents commercial and literary fiction, narrative non-fiction, current affairs, pop culture and business.
The PEN American Center reelected its officers to new one-year terms, including the reappointment of president Kwame Anthony Appiah.
Bookforum editor Chris Lehmann has joined the new Yahoo News team, the Observer reports.
Further to yesterday's story on Grove/Atlantic's upcoming release of the anticipated novel MATTERHORN, the publisher says that El Leon Arts never published their edition last April. It was pulled right before publication in concert with Grove's interest (and Grove worked with the author on a complete revision that the reduced the still-big 592-page book by 20 percent), so their version will be the "one and only published edition."]]>
Bookselling and More: Charging the Self-Published; A New Subscription Plan; Hosting Book Clubstag:www.publishersmarketplace.com,2010:/lunch//2.63272010-03-17T14:01:50Z2010-03-17T14:02:49ZWe noted short items in the past regarding how the Boulder Bookstore charges all the self-published authors who want to...Publishers Lunch The fee structure ranges from $25 to stock five copies and $75 to feature a book in the Recommended section, up to $255 for an in-store reading and book-signing (plus website and newsletter mention). Our first instinct was that they are charging too little for the more elaborate plans, knowing what third-parties are charging for marketing plans--and indeed, head buyer Arsen Kashkashian says "mst people will come in at one of the higher fee amounts." The store even has a two-page consignment brochure explaining the program and giving other tips to authors.
But here's the real payoff, as we've discussed before: not only does the store turn what was drudge work into something that generates cash, but they also reinforce a truly local connection that chain stores and online stores can't match. That's what Local Loyalty is all about--making the most of what your community wants from you, rather than making your community guilty that they don't want to spend full price for commodity goods.
"Kashkashian says, have been generally grateful for the opportunity to sell and promote work that might otherwise be seen and appreciated only by their friends/spouses/moms: 'I want the marketing, I want the exposure. I worked so hard on this project, and you guys are the only ones who could help me with it.'" That's worth a lot, and it turns grateful, paying authors into the store's own viral marketers when they bring in friends and spread the word. They pay you for the privilege of promoting your store! Nieman Lab
We've also long been fans of experimentation with new types of subscription plans--from Powell's Indiespensable selections, Roxanne Coady's Just the Right Book venture, and Safari Online to Disney Publishing's new subscription website, Bloomsbury's growing library subscriptions, and publisher Open Letter's "season subscriptions."
In that mode, Unbridled Books announced yesterday subscription plans for 3 and 6 books from the house, shipped pre-publication, at $60 and $100 respectively. Plus they throw in a free backlist title and a discount on the other books. Info page
The Chicago Tribune reports on Borders' initiative to host book club gatherings within their stores. "Signs and posters telling shoppers to bring their book group to the store have gone out from corporate headquarters in Ann Arbor." Spokesperson Mary Davis says, "We're encouraging stores to reach out to the public to say, 'We're here.' It's a way to drive traffic to the stores." Tribune]]>
eBook Releases from Grisham and Baldaccitag:www.publishersmarketplace.com,2010:/lunch//2.63252010-03-16T14:55:14Z2010-03-16T14:56:05ZOver a year after first announcing John Grisham's intention to release his backlist in ebook editions, today Knopf Doubleday put...Publishers Lunch Separately, when David Baldacci's new book DELIVER US FROM EVIL is released on April 20, Hachette Book Group's editions will include an "enriched" electronic version they're calling the Writer's Cut eBook. In the release, HBG ceo David Young says, "For David Baldacci's fans, this is a chance to see his creative process revealed, and deepen the connection with an author they love to read. This enhanced eBook is the perfect marriage of innovation and great storytelling."
Baldacci tells the AP, "I want people to have a great experience and give them a behind-the-scenes look at what I do, the way you would have it on a DVD." Priced at $15.99, a dollar above the starting list price of the regular ebook (which would go to $12.99 after hitting the bestseller list), the enhancements include an alternate ending to the story, deleted passages, an audio interview, video of Baldacci at work, and research photos taken by the author. Thus it will work on ebook platforms that handle video and color, but "Hachette is still working on the enriched version and is unsure of its availability" on eInk screens.
Baldacci also indicates that, though he received some negative online reader "reviews" last when when the ebook of FIRST FAMILY was selling initially for more than $15, sales followed the general increase in the market: "I just saw the royalty statements for 'First Family,' and sales for the e-book were up 400 percent over the e-book of my previous novels. It was a very vocal minority that was upset and at the end of the day it didn't have any impact."
In an online interview with Charlotte Abbott on Friday, Young and HBG svp of digital Maja Thomas indicated that the company is working with many of their biggest authors--including Stephenie Meyer, James Patterson, Michael Connelly, Brad Meltzer and others--on a variety of experimental enhanced ebooks. Thomas noted "some of it is platform-specific, and some of it is platform agnostic," adding, "we'll have to see in the next few months how much the consumer loves what we have done." Calling it "a very exiting and dynamic time," Young emphasized the importance of now "having direct feedback from our readers," adding that "boy, do we hear from them."
In the interview, they also said that the company has digitized and made available as ebooks 90 percent of the books on their list that lend themselves to current electronic formats. When it come to electronic rights and royalties, Young said "we certainly have one or two issues around that, but it is literally a handful of authors where we are still having to negotiate those rights with agents." He also noted that "some of our authors do not want to appear in this format, and that's absolutely their prerogative." For more quotes and reflections from the interview, Mike Shatzkin writes about it on his blog.]]>
People and Awardstag:www.publishersmarketplace.com,2010:/lunch//2.63222010-03-16T14:35:57Z2010-03-16T15:13:09ZAt Grand Central, Ben Greenberg has been promoted to senior editor. He currently has two books on the New York...Publishers Lunch
Ben Greenberg has been promoted to senior editor. He
currently has two books on the New York Times bestseller list: I AM
OZZY, and ABRAHAM LINCOLN, VAMPIRE HUNTER.
Editor of Rick Riordan's Percy Jackson & the Olympians series and many other titles Jennifer Besser will join Putnam's Children's on April 12 as vp and publisher, reporting to Penguin Children's president Don Weisberg. She was most recently Executive Editor at Disney Book Group.
At Dutton, Jamie McDonald has been promoted to senior publicist.
Unbridled jumped the ABA's announcement of May's Indie Next picks,
celebrating the selection of Emily St. John Mandel's second novel THE
SINGER'S GUN as the No. 1 pick.
Alan Bradley's THE SWEETNESS AT THE BOTTOM OF THE PIE has won the 2009 Dilys Award, given by the
Independent Mystery Booksellers Association to the book their members
most enjoyed handselling.
C-Span has converted nearly all of its video archives into digital video, available for free through their web site. Though the focus is on 23 years of Congressional sessions, the ambitious initiative also includes 8,842 BookTV episodes and clips and 812 Booknotes episodes. The presentation includes the most recent clips and the most watched programs, as well as organization by topic. BookTV listing]]>
Bookselling: BN's Matterhorn Push, More Online Rentals, Children's Store to Closetag:www.publishersmarketplace.com,2010:/lunch//2.63212010-03-16T14:32:28Z2010-03-16T14:34:54ZPublishers Lunch Grove/Atlantic publisher Morgan Entrekin says in the release, "I'm grateful to the booksellers involved with the Discover Great New Writers program who are open to good works from any source. Without them, this amazing book would never have gotten the chance it's getting." And Marlantes notes, "Matterhorn has had a lot of lucky breaks on its road to publication, and I'm incredibly grateful to everyone who has gotten behind it, but the simple truth is that none of it would have happened without the support of Barnes & Noble and its Discover Great New Writers program." Release
Follett is joining the stampede to online textbook rental offerings, partnering with BookRenter.com. Release
Noblesville, IN children's bookstore The Wild is closing after the owners were unable to complete a deal with new buyers for the store. IndyStar]]>
Mantel and Holmes Top NBCC Winners, and More Awards Newstag:www.publishersmarketplace.com,2010:/lunch//2.63162010-03-12T00:36:41Z2010-03-12T15:08:55ZThe National Book Critics Circle Awards went to:Wolf Hall, by Hilary Mantel (Fiction)The Age of Wonder, by Richard Holmes (General...Publishers Lunch Wolf Hall, by Hilary Mantel (Fiction) The Age of Wonder, by Richard Holmes (General Nonfiction) Cheever: A Life, by Blake Bailey (Biography)
[all of the above correspond to directly to our compilation Best of the Best of 2009 list]
Somewhere Towards the End, by Diana Athill (Autobiography) Versed, by Rae Armantrout (Poetry) Notes from No Man's Land, Eula Biss (Criticism)
In other awards news, the NY Public Library named the finalists for their annual Young Lions Award for a fiction writer 35 or under:
Jedediah Berry, The Manual of Detection Katie Kitamura, The Longshot Philipp Meyer, American Rust C.E. Morgan, All the Living Wells Tower, Everything Ravaged, Everything Burned
The regional winners of the Commonwealth Prize were also named, with the overall winners to be selected on April 12:
Best First Book Adaobi Tricia Nwaubeni, I Do Not Come to You by Chance (Nigeria) Shandi Mitchell, Under This Unbroken Sky (Canada) Daniyal Mueenuddin, In Other Rooms, Other Wonders (Pakistan) Glenda Guest, Siddon Rock (Australia)
Best Book Marie Heese, The Double Crown (South Africa) Michael Crummey, Galore (Canada) Rana Dasgupta, Solo (UK) Albert Wendt, The Adventures of Vela (Samoa)]]>
Wiley Rises In All Segmentstag:www.publishersmarketplace.com,2010:/lunch//2.63122010-03-11T13:28:39Z2010-03-11T13:31:22ZWiley reported third quarter sales of $427 million this morning, a 14 percent increase driven in large part by currency...Publishers Lunch The professional/trade division grew 10 percent at $107 million for the quarter, up 7 percent on a currency neutral basis. The company says "sales growth was strong in all regions, especially the U.S., where the holiday season was solid. Business publishing was driven by social media books; technology by books on new windows operating systems and certification; and consumer by the Meredith publishing agreement and For Dummies brand sales."
They announced that in their next fiscal year they will publish a line of "official" licensed, branded Facebook instruction guides, The Definitive Facebook Guides.
Higher education "is having a record-setting year, out-performing the market with strong results in all geographic regions and subject categories," according to ceo William Pesce. At $91.6 million the group was up 23 percent, while STM recorded sales of $228.4 million, up 13 percent. Release]]>
People, Etc.tag:www.publishersmarketplace.com,2010:/lunch//2.63112010-03-10T23:27:35Z2010-03-11T15:47:52ZAt St. Martin's, Marc Resnick has been promoted to executive editor, after over thirteen years with the house.Peggy Hageman has...Publishers Lunch
Marc Resnick has been promoted to executive editor, after over thirteen years with the house.
Peggy Hageman has joined the Overlook Press as an associate editor. She was previously at HarperCollins.
Mark Levine has joined BookMasters Distribution Services as publisher relations manager, joining newly appointed vp of business development Tony Proe. Most recently Levine as an acquisitions editor for Barnes & Noble Publishing.
powerHouse will use Random House Publisher Services for sales and distribution to the book and specialty trades.
Gail Hareven's The Confessions of Noa Weber, translated from the Hebrew by Dalya Bilu won the Best Translated Book Award for fiction.
Google Books announced yesterday an agreement with the Italian Ministry of Cultural Heritage to digitize "up to a million" out-of-copyright works from the National Libraries of Florence and
Rome. It's their first partnership with Italian libraries, and "the first time we've worked with a ministry of culture." They will provide the ministry with copies of the scans so that they can be included in other aggregations, such as the EU project Europeana.]]>
Penguin Adds Science Imprinttag:www.publishersmarketplace.com,2010:/lunch//2.63072010-03-10T16:09:44Z2010-03-10T16:11:09ZIn July Penguin will debut their newest imprint, Current, focused on science books for general readers. Portfolio and Sentinel president...Publishers Lunch The first title is a July release by journalist David Stipp, THE YOUTH PILL: Scientists at the Brink of an Anti-Aging Revolution, followed by Corina Yen's THE MAN WHO LIED TO HIS LAPTOP in September.]]>
Anonymous Official Says Canada Is "Leaning" Towards Approving Amazon's Expansion Plantag:www.publishersmarketplace.com,2010:/lunch//2.63092010-03-10T16:07:17Z2010-03-10T16:07:56ZThe Canadian Booksellers' Association has urged the country's government to reject Amazon's application to operate their own Canadian-based warehouse and...Publishers Lunch Part of the booksellers' argument is that "individual Canadian booksellers have traditionally played a key role in ensuring the promotion of Canadian authors and Canadian culture." But Amazon vp of global public policy Paul Misener says: "At some level it seems preposterous that that claim could be made, especially given our track record of eight years serving Canadian customers and authors and publishers. To claim that somehow an American company can't help Canadian culture is just proved wrong by the facts." Misener points out that Amazon sells Canadian-published works to customers from over 170 countries. "I don't think anybody is doing anything near this to help disseminate Canadian cultural products globally."
He says they want to cut supply chain costs and pass them along to customers, while also "increasing the number of categories of products available, just like we have elsewhere in the world." Globe and Mail]]>
Announcements: Imprintstag:www.publishersmarketplace.com,2010:/lunch//2.63052010-03-09T15:43:04Z2010-03-09T15:44:34ZLerner Publishing's Carolrhoda Books is launching a young adult line this fall, Carolrhoda Lab.Speaking of young adult books, yesterday's Automat...Publishers Lunch
Carolrhoda Lab.
Speaking of young adult books, yesterday's
Automat link to an LAT piece on the rising popularity of YA novels
among adult readers was so heavily re-tweeted that it's worth a
separate link. "Authors may gear their novels toward the junior and
senior high crowd, but adults are snapping up the books, often about
misfit teens or fantasy worlds.... Attracted by well-written,
fast-paced and engaging stories that span the gamut of genres and
subjects, such readers have mainstreamed a niche long derided as just
for kids."
Kris Vreeland at Vroman's Bookstore confirms, "You have a lot of
different people coming to young adult in a lot of different ways." LAT
Yesterday Bloomsbury announced the launch of Berlin Academic in Germany, following the same model as their UK-based start-up Bloomsbury Academic. The new Berlin Academic staff includes digital marketing manager Katja Oechel (formerly at Elsevier and Springer), global strategist Catharina Maracke, Global Strategist (former Director of Creative Commons International), and non executive director Malcolm Campbell (director, Earthscan Ltd; formerly Chairman, Berg Publishers).
In the UK, Mark Booth's new imprint at Hodder & Stoughton launching this fall will be called Coronet--reviving a moniker that was closed in 2004 and previously published authors ranging from PG Wodehouse and Ian Fleming to Fay Weldon.]]>
Announcements: Peopletag:www.publishersmarketplace.com,2010:/lunch//2.63042010-03-09T15:41:17Z2010-03-09T15:41:55ZThe Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas, Austin has acquired the archive of the late David Foster Wallace....Publishers Lunch
David Foster Wallace. The collection will include materials for his forthcoming, posthumous work The Pale King upon the book's publication, scheduled for April 2011. Little, Brown is donating their own DFW correspondence and internal memos to the archive, too. The center has already posted a few samples from the collection online. Release
Macmillan Audio has hired Liz Edelstein as digital content & marketing manager. She was a senior program manager at America Online/Netscape Communications and is the author of twelve romance/science fiction novels.]]>