Publisher of the Golden Books Young Readers Group Kate Klimo is stepping down as of March 31, Random House Children’s president and publisher Chip Gibson announced internally on Friday. Klimo has worked at Random House since 1984, and spearheaded the acquisition of Golden in 2001. She will be director of creative development at Media Assets Management Associates, where she “will continue turning our books into great TV shows.” (Klimo helped develop The Cat in the Hat Knows A Lot About That! into a PBS Kids show and “has six other shows based on our books in development.”) Gibson notes, “she […]
Archives for March 2012
Children’s Deal Activity Looking Flat In Lead-Up to Bologna Fair
With the Bologna Book Fair launching next, we took a look at how this year’s deal activity compares to last year’s. And the results are…inconclusive. The problem with a straight comparison is that this year the fair is convening about two weeks earlier than last year. If we look at the US children’s deal reports beginning January 1 both this year and last, the results are almost exactly the same: Jan. 1 – March 15, 2012 1 Children’s (all) 231 2 Children’s: Young Adult 115 3 Children’s: Picture book 61 4 Children’s: Middle grade 51 Jan. 1 – March 25, […]
Bookselling: Labor Issues At the Strand; Douglas Holdings To Keep Thalia; Nicholas Hoare Stores To Close; and More
WNET’s Metrofocus blog reports on labor issues affecting the Strand Bookstore, where employees are struggling to negotiate with the bookstore’s owners with respect to what they see as a ‘two-tier wage system’, which if not rectified may lead to a strike. The issue stems from the Strand hiring 33-35 non-unionized managers in the past year, and unionized employees were offered a new contract “that would reduce their paid personal days and sick days by nearly half, and nearly double the amount each employee would have to pay for their health insurance premiums.” In addition, a 50 cent-per-six month raise that […]
People, Etc.
Publishing veteran Marie Coolman joins Bloomsbury as senior director of publicity and communications on March 19, reporting to Cristina Gilbert. Coolman comes to Bloomsbury from Hyperion, where she has overseen publicity and communications since November 2008. Sarah Freese at WordServe Literary has been promoted to associate agent. Lucy Abrahams has been appointed as literary scout for Metaichmio in Greece and Natur & Kultur in Sweden. BEA has announced its full slate of author breakfast appearances. Tuesday’s author breakfast, hosted by Stephen Colbert will feature Junot Diaz, Barbara Kingsolver and Jo Nesbo; John Green, Lois Lowry and Kadir Nelson will speak at […]
Sterling Gets Smaller As Leaver Heads to Quarto
The compression of Sterling Publishing that we indicated was likely when reporting that Barnes & Noble had been unable to find a buyer for the division has begun. Sterling president Marcus Leaver is leaving to return to England and join Quarto in the new position of chief operating officer, in line to succeed chief executive Lawrence Orbach when he retires, starting in April. Quarto had indicated in late February “the candidate has been identified, and will be announced shortly.” Leaver says in the announcement, “This is a fascinating time in publishing with abundant opportunity and Quarto’s global perspective is unique. […]
People, Etc.
At Goldberg McDuffie Communications, Kathleen Zrelak has been promoted to vp, director of publicity. Author of PLEASE LOOK AFTER MOM Kyung-Sook Shin has won the Man Asian Literary Prize, receiving $30,000. Translator Chi-Young Kim also received US$5,000. The Bancroft Prize for history is being shared this year by Anne Hyde’s Empires, Nations and Families: A History of the North American West, 1800-1860; Daniel Rodgers’ Age of Fracture; and Tomiko Brown-Nagin’s Courage to Dissent: Atlanta and the Long History of the Civil Rights Movement. As part of the relocation of Bonnier’s Weldon Owen from Australia to London, Martina Challis has been […]