Catching up from the storm, the Authors Guild posted a member alert on Monday saying that the proposed Penguin Random House merger “merits close scrutiny from antitrust officials at the Justice Department or the FTC.” As Sarah Weinman reported last week, the Authors Guild filed an objection with the FTC over Bertelsmann’s last big purchase, of Random House itself, in 1998, ultimately to no avail. The Guild says the merged companies’ “share of the U.S. trade book market for fiction and narrative non-fiction likely exceeds 35%. Their share in certain submarkets is no doubt even higher.” Authors Guild president Scott […]
