Breaking the pattern we so carefully documented earlier on Tuesday, the favorite has won the Booker Prize for just the second time in the past nine years. Julian Barnes, nominated three times before for the award, won on his fourth try for THE SENSE OF AN ENDING. And Knopf, which had moved up the book’s publication date from January 2012 to October 5, announced it will go back to press for an additional 40,000 copies, on top of the initial 36,000 first printing. (Among outlets monitored by Nielsen BookScan, Barnes’ hardcover edition has approximately 2,500 copies through last Saturday in […]
Archives for October 2011
People, Etc.
At Crown, Rica Allannic has been promoted to executive editor, Clarkson Potter, and Kate Tyler has been promoted to publicity director, Crown Illustrated, which comprises the Clarkson Potter, Potter Craft, Potter Style, Watson-Guptill, and Amphoto Books imprints. Kim Small has also been named publicity director for Potter Style, in addition to directing publicity for Potter Craft, Watson-Guptill, and Amphoto Books. Laura Meyer will join Harper UK as chief information officer in mid-January 2012, reporting to coo Keith Mullock. Meyer, who will be tasked with the responsibility of upgrading the publisher’s systems to deal with the change towards digital, will also […]
People, Etc.
At St. Martin’s, Jeff Dodes has been appointed to the new position of evp, marketing and digital media strategy. He will direct the creative development, marketing and financial planning for all titles from St. Martin’s and its imprints. Most recently, he led the marketing and digital media department for Sony Music’s Jive Label Group. Sally Richardson and Matthew Shear, to whom Dodes will report, comment in the announcement: “Jeff brings a whole new level of expertise to our marketing efforts. He not only has a superior knowledge of what has worked in the past but also a keen sense of […]
Looking to Tonight’s Booker
Julian Barnes is in the running for the Booker Prize for the fourth time, this year for THE SENSE OF AN ENDING, and he heads into tonight’s awards ceremony as the odds-on favorite. Which is often not a good thing. As our handy chart below shows, over the past eight years the bettor’s choice has only won once. (We stopped at 2004, since 2003 was the year that the Booker web site at least appeared to post Yann Martel’s victory a week ahead of the ceremony.) The announcement is due at 4:48 Eastern (US) time today. Year Favorite Winner 2010 […]
Bookselling: Crown Books Name Lives On; More Former Borders Locations Get New Stores
Once-mighty bookselling chain Crown Books went bankrupt in the mid-1990s, but the name has lived on ever since thanks to San Diego-based A&S Booksellers, which has operated more than 300 temporary locations over the years. At the moment there are eight “pop-up” locations operating in the San Diego area, including three in locations once operated by Borders. “We are the neighborhood people, and we’re not going away,” A&S owner Andy Weiss told the San Diego Union-Tribune. “It’s a great, independent business, but you have to know your market and what people want in a localized area.” Union-Tribune Speaking of former […]
That Article
Until this morning’s mystifying Lauren Myracle news, people in publishing were shaking their heads in a variety of ways over today’s NYT piece on Amazon’s publishing efforts. The idea is that buying a celebrity memoir at auction and reissuing a self-published work for no advance changes the game, but it mostly proves that almost any article about Amazon gives a reporter a shot at the newspaper’s front page, even when it contains no actual news. Amazon’s Russ Grandinetti “said publishers were in love with their own demise” and commented, “It’s always the end of the world.” At least in the […]