Following investor Ron Burkle’s accumulation of a large block of BN stock, the company’s board announced yesterday the passage of a “shareholder rights plan,” aka poison pill–largely out of favor now (except at companies where the founder still controls a third of the stock). The adopted the measure “in response to the recent rapid accumulation of a significant portion of Barnes & Noble’s outstanding common stock” and insist it “is intended to protect the company and its stockholders from efforts to obtain control of the company that are inconsistent with the best interests of the company and its stockholders.” The […]
Archives for November 2009
People: Miner to Crown, and More
Sydny Miner is moving to Crown Publishers as executive editor, starting December 14 and reporting to publisher Tina Constable. She will acquire practical advice, how-to, health, and fitness books, as well as memoirs. Miner was a senior editor at Simon & Schuster, where she worked for 26 years. Brandon Proia joins Mary Anne Thompson Associates as a scout on November 30. He has been an associate editor at Basic. Separately, the company has been appointed US book scout for Ediouro/Agir/Nova Fronteria effective immediately. In the UK, Kate Shaw is leaving Aitken Alexander Associates after nine years to join The Viney […]
Awards
The lead-in to tonight’s National Book Awards has been awfully quiet, hasn’t it? Yesterday novelist M.G. Vassanji won Canada’s Governor General’s award for his memoir A PLACE WITHIN, as Kate Pullinger was the surprise winner of the fiction prize for THE MISTRESS OF NOTHING. The Man Asian Literary prize went to bestselling author in China Su Tong’s political fable THE BOAT TO REDEMPTION. The award goes to a work not yet published English, and is designed to bring “exciting new Asian authors to the attention of the world literary community.” The Guardian says Howard Goldblatt–who also translated the 2007 winner, […]
Graphic Arts Will Liquidate
Graphic Arts Center Publishing filed for liquidation in a Portland, OR federal bankruptcy court last Friday. The filing says that sales fell from $10.3 million in 2008 to $5.1 million for the first eight months of 2009. Last year’s sales were helped by their distribution relationship with Epicenter Press, which published Kaylene Johnson’s biography of Sarah Palin. Former board member and bookseller Michael Powell tells the Oregonian, “They’re having a hard time like everyone else. They did every cost cutting thing they could do.” The two largest creditors listed were Ingram, which give the publisher a $1.5 million loan, and […]
Harlequin Adds Self-Publishing Line
Following the same model as Thomas Nelson’s recently-announced WestBow Press, Harlequin has started a self-publishing line. Like Nelson, they are outsourcing most of the work to Author Solutions as their partner. Unlike Nelson, they aren’t afraid to use their own name for the line, which is called Harlequin Horizons. As they say on the site: “The intent behind creating Harlequin Horizons is to give more aspiring romance writers and women’s fiction writers the opportunity to publish their books and achieve their dreams without going through the submission process with a traditional publishing house. “However, we understand you may aspire to […]
Finally: Canada Gets their Kindle
This morning Amazon announced a Canada-compliant Kindle is ready for immediate shipping. (Canada had been left aside at the initial release of the international version of Kindle.) As for other international customers, the units are priced in US dollars, and the promised “typical” low low price for new releases and Globe and Mail bestsellers is $11.99 “or less.” Amazon is offering Kindle version of the Globe and Mail and National Post, and will add Canwest’s top newspapers shortly.Release Separately, BN.com addressed a frequent complaint among their customers on one of their blogs yesterday. As of mid-December, they will start accepting […]