At ICM Partners, Kristyn Keene and Kari Stuart have both been promoted to agent. Keene joined the agency in 2006; Stuart has been with ICM for seven years.
Alistair Burtenshaw, who left his positions at Reed Exhibitions earlier this month, will move up to chair of charity Booktrust (where he has served as deputy chair since 2008).
The Smoking Gun highlights multiple lawsuits filed recently by Penguin to recover advances from authors who the publisher says never delivered their manuscripts. The suits look to recover advances and interest from:
New Yorker staff writer Rebecca Mead
$20,000, for a 2003 deal to collect her journalism
[Mead did have another announced 2003 deal, for the book about “the selling of the American Wedding” that Penguin Press did publish in 2007]
Elizabeth Wurtzel
$33,000 (and at least $7,500 in interest), for a book to help teenagers cope with depression
Former “Wonkette” blogger Ana Marie Cox
$81,250 (and at least $50,000 in interest), for a 2006 contract promising a “humorous examination of the next generation of political activists”
[This was a follow-up after Riverhead published her debut novel]
Conrad Tillard
$38,000 for a 2005 memoir deal about his “journey from the Ivy League to the Nation of Islam” and break with Louis Farrakhan
[Penguin’s Tarcher imprint was the second would-be buyer of this book; HarperCollins announced a deal for it in 2003, with Karen Hunter as co-author. The version Tarcher bought in 2005 had Playthell Benjamin as co-writer]
In a league by itself, they are also seeking $30,000 (and at least $10,000) from disgraced Holocaust fabricator Herman Rosenblat.
Trident Media Group ceo Robert Gottlieb says in a posted comment, “If Penguin did this to one of Trident’s authors we could cut them out of all our submissions.”