Anne Kubek has joined the InScribe Digital as EVP, General Manager. She had been EVP of merchandising and marketing at Borders, spending 20 years with the company before leaving in late 2009.
Meg LaBorde Kuehn joins Kirkus Media in the new position of vp of business development. Her most recently publishing position was coo of Greenleaf Book Group.
Former Granta Books managing director David Graham has joined Aurum and its associated trade publishing division, where he will be setting up a new imprint, Union Press, which will focus on “serious literary writing”, specifically non-fiction. Former Granta staffers Alex Clark and Rosalind Porter are joining the imprint as editor-at-large and editorial director, respectively.
Macmillan launched romance community site as a companion to Tor.com, www.heroesandheartbreakers.com. It provides original stories, pre-release excerpts, blog posts, giveaways and more “in a publisher-neutral environment” that will feature content and works from all publishers across the genre.
Distributor of outdoor books to outdoor stores AlpenBooks has reportedly written to publishers to say they are closing at the end of February. We’re told the letter says they have no money to pay vendors, but will return inventory before the end of the month on request.
The Washington Independent Review of Books has launched online, adding a new source of reviews along with literary reference and more in the place recently named the country’s most literate city. Historian and author David O. Stewart is president, and the site is sponsored by the nonprofit AIW Freedom to Write Fund.
Penguin will start using NetGalley for galleys and promotional materials.
Consortium is adding four new publishers for the spring 2011 season: 1001 Inventions, Behler Publications, GLAS New Russian Writing, and Nortia Press.
Simon & Schuster will take over sales, distribution and fulfillment for Ripley Entertainment in the US and Canada as of April 1.
Software and services provider Publishing Technology has opened a Paris office to provide support to the French market and will open an office in India in New Delhi in March.
Charles Foran won the Charles Taylor Prize for Literary Non-Fiction for his book Mordecai: The Life and Times, a biography of Mordecai Richler.