Today It’s HarperMorrow HarperCollins has merged a number of the Harper imprints with the Morrow/Avon lines in a new division to be called HarperMorrow — all of which will be under the direction of newly named president and group publisher Michael Morrison. Imprints under his direction comprise: HarperCollins, William Morrow, HarperEntertainment, Morrow Cookbooks, HarperPerennial, Avon, Eos, Dark Alley, Amistad, HarperAudio, HarperLarge Print and PerfectBound. Morrison reports to Brian Murray, Group President of HarperCollins Publishers. One impetus for the move mentioned is to work towards creating clear and separate brand identities for both Harper and Morrow. Harper publisher Susan Weinberg, Amistad […]
Archives for November 2004
Lunch for Monday, November 8
Two Counts of Lawsuit Against Patterson Move Forward A Southern District court judge allowed allegations of breach of contract and copyright infringement to proceed against novelist James Patterson, while dismissing seven other charges, including misappropriation and unjust enrichment, according to a short piece in NY Lawyer. Patterson is being sued by Christina Sharp, which whom he was involved romantically for a period between June 1996 and April 1997. Sharp alleges that CAT AND MOUSE includes some of her work, and asserts that SUZANNE’S DIARY FOR NICHOLAS was based on her idea. Judge Gerard E. Lynch wrote: “In tandem with their […]
On Gordon Cader
[This entry was originally sent by email on November 4, 2004, and was not posted to the site. Others wound up reposting it to the web, though those sites have since expired, so this has been posted after the fact and backdated for posterity.] We have an oddly personal relationship going here, you and I, in this daily conversation about publishing that occasionally diverges, from my little wisecracks to broken refrigerators, school events, and back again. As mentioned on Monday, I’ve had anniversaries on my mind this week– though today’s occasion is of an entirely different nature. As a result, […]
Lunch for Thursday, November 4
Earnings Reports: Harper and Dover Earnings were nearly flat at HarperCollins for their fiscal first quarter, rising $1 million from a year ago to $60 million, as sales grew almost 5 percent, to $364 million. At Courier’s Dover Publishing, sales for the full fiscal year were nearly flat, rising $.5 million to $36.9 million, but profits rose 8 percent, to $6.3 million. One growth sector for the company continues to be direct-to-consumer sales, which rose 7 percent in the fourth quarter and 5 percent for the full year. International sales, though flat in the fourth quarter, also rose sharply for […]
Lunch for Wednesday, November 3
Personnel News and Features The election has trumped most industry news today, but there is always more to report from the deal and job fronts. (As noted yesterday, our own small bit of job news is that we’ve added an RSS feed to our thriving Job Board; if you know what that means, just go to the job board page to add it to your RSS aggregator of choice.) Larry Zilavy will leave his post as evp of corporate finance and strategic planning at Barnes & Noble “to devote more time to his personal investments and philanthropic interests.” His responsibilities […]
Lunch for Tuesday, November 2
Tenet Sale Coming Soon, with Other Agents In the Wings Former CIA director George Tenet has wrapped up a couple of weeks of meetings with publishers, guided by attorney Bob Barnett, and an auction for rights is likely to begin next week or the week after. Sources indicate 12 publishers (or imprints) are interested in the project, and informal reports from Tenet’s meetings indicate that he made a strong impression and intends to write a candid book that will look both at his service — under both Democratic and Republican presidents — during difficult and historic times, as well as […]