Knopf publisher Sonny Mehta will receive the London Book Fair’s Lifetime Achievement Award in International Publishing.
Nancy Planitzer is joining Greater Talent Network as an account executive as part of their Publishers Speakers Bureaus division (which works with both SImon & Schuster and Hachette Book Group). She was formerly an account coordinator with the Macmillan Speakers Bureau.
Franklin & Siegal has been appointed literary scout for China Citic Press in Beijing.
Michael Chabon and his wife Ayelet Waldman are co-writing and executive producing a drama for HBO, currently called Hobgoblin, about “a motley group of con-men and magicians who use their skills at deception to battle Hitler and his forces during WWII.” Variety says it is only in “the very early stages of development.”
Variety
South Carolina’s 39-year-old governor (and Tea Party favorite) Nikki Haley, the youngest state leader in the country, has started working on a memoir. “Haley says the memoir will, and must, cover good times and bad times. She will address the allegations of infidelity — which she has denied — and another campaign controversy: why Haley, who has a degree in accounting, has frequently paid fees for not paying her income taxes on time. ‘It’s going to talk about all aspects of my personal life, and my political life,’ she says of her book.” Bob Barnett at Williams & Connolly is representing the project.
AP
Abrams’ Amulet Books imprint has announced an “updated, expanded, and revised” version of Jeff Kinney’s WIMPY KID DO-IT-YOURSELF BOOK, complete with a new cover design, for release on May 10 with an expected one-million-copy first printing. The original edition has 3 million copies in print. Later this week they will begin a comics contest open to fans up to age sixteen to promote the new book, and Kinney will announce the winner at the ALA conference in New Orleans on June 25. Abrams says that over 47 million copies of Wimpy Kid books are in print in the US.
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences has awarded $25,000 grants each to Cari Beauchamp and Patrick Keating to fund books on Gloria Swanson and camera movement in classic Hollywood cinema, respectively.
Release
56 high school students who submitted essays on how a particular book inspired their choice of career were the beneficiaries of “Book Dollars for Scholars” from James Patterson. Each student will receive book gift certificates ranging in value from $250 to $5,000 which can be redeemed at Indiebound-affiliated bookstores.
AP