President and director of paperback sales at Penguin Norman Lidofsky will retire at the end of 2014 after more than 32 years with the company. In a staff memo, Penguin Random House president and coo Madeline McIntosh praised Lidofsky’s “sales leadership, book passion, and dedication” and called him “a generous and thoughtful colleague, an inspiring leader, and above all—a consummate salesman working unceasingly in support of Penguin’s books, authors, and publishers.”
McIntosh added: “[Lidofsky] has led the way in building the trade paperback program into an industry force… He has helped to keep Penguin Classics vibrant, sustaining its presence as one of the most trusted and recognized sources of classic literature in the world… He has helped Plume come into its own… And he was instrumental in the birth of Riverhead Books twenty years ago.”
At Plume, Kate Napolitano has been promoted to editor.
Emilia Rhodes joined Harper Children’s on June 9 as senior editor for the Harper Teen imprint. Previously she was an editor at Alloy Entertainment.
Lathea Williams has joined Sourcebooks as assistant publicity manager, working out of the company’s New York office. Previously she was a publicist at Harlequin.
At Foundry Literary + Media, Matt Wise has been promoted to agent. He is interested narrative nonfiction and commercial fiction.
At Kuhn Projects, Nicole Tourtelot has been promoted to agent.
After over a decade in Boston, The Strothman Agency will relocate to New York on July 1.
Paul Yoon won the NYPL Young Lions Award for Snow Hunters.
The Target Book Club pick for July is Mother, Mother by Koren Zailckas.
Laurence Copel, founder of the Lower Ninth Ward Street Library in New Orleans, has won the first Lemony Snicket Prize for Noble Librarians Faced With Adversity, co-sponsored by the American Library Association and author Daniel Handler.
Soho Press has extended its sales and distribution agreement with Penguin Random House Publisher Services, which began in 2011, in a multi-year deal. Since signing on with PRHPS, Soho’s sales have more than doubled.
Del Commune Enterprises will scout for French publisher Univers Poche‘s adult trade lines (Fleuve Editions, 10/18, and Pocket) as of July 1.
Children’s book author and illustrator Eric Hill, 86, died at home in California after a short illness. His publisher called him “a master of simple design. He created one of the world’s most loveable children’s book characters – Spot, the charming, naughty, playful puppy, loved and appreciated across the world.”