After we reported a week ago that Harper told a wide swath of ebook accounts that they would return to full agency for ebooks as of Tuesday morning Pacific time, the big question wasn’t so much Amazon as pricing. In September 2012, when HarperCollins was the first settling publisher to comply with the consent decrees through “agency lite” pricing, they also raised many of their consumer list ebook prices, often by many dollars above the original iBooks pricing “brackets” that pegged ebook prices to print book prices. As it turned out, Harper was the only of the settling publishers to […]
Archives for April 2015
People, Etc.
Wiley ceo Stephen Smith will retire on June 1 as a result of previously disclosed medical reasons (Smith was diagnosed with urological cancer.) Mark Allin, currently coo, will succeed Smith as ceo, earning a base annual salary of $750,000. Chairman Peter Wiley said in the announcement: “[Allin] has been instrumental in restructuring and reorganizing the business,” as well as “reallocating resources to high-growth areas.” Elias Altman has joined Zachary Shuster Harmsworth as a literary agent, where he will focus on literary fiction, memoirs, and a broad range of narrative and expository nonfiction including works of history, science, travel, and cultural […]
In London, Everything Old Is New Again
In a year of transitions for three of the world’s major book fairs, the London Book Fair opened Tuesday in a return to its historical home at the Olympia Exhibition Center. You can go home again, but usually by the time you do, someone has redecorated, and today LBF veterans went through multiple stages of soothing the cognitive dissonance of the return to Olympia. While there is a vague familiarity to the scene, everything is very different as well, and many fairgoers spent much of the opening morning getting situated. First there was the transportation, since the special above-ground train […]
People, Etc.
Morgan Parker joins Little A as editor, acquiring fiction and poetry. She was previously education director at the Museum of Contemporary African Diasporan Arts (MoCADA) and poetry editor of Coconut Magazine and The Offing. At Abrams, Chris Blank has been promoted to director of online marketing operations, and Monica Shah moves up to director of special markets. In addition, Jody Mosley is moving over to the children’s department in the newly created position of associate publisher as of May 1. She is currently director of special markets. At Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, Liz Anderson has been promoted to social media manager […]
Slaughter Moves to Harper In Global Deal, As Harper Adds Four More International Lines
HarperCollins officially announced from London on Tuesday morning a multi-territory four-book deal with bestselling author Karin Slaughter. The relationship begins with PRETTY GIRLS, now set for US publication in September, which Harper will publish in all countries in which it operates on their newly-expanded international platform — except for the UK, Australia, New Zealand and Holland. “Subsequent books” in the deal “will include additional territories,” the announcement notes, meaning Harper will publish in the UK as well later in the multi-book deal. (The Bookseller says Harper will start with book three in the UK.) Until very recently PRETTY GIRLS was listed for July publication […]
HarperCollins Reaches New Multi-Year Agreement With Amazon
As we intimated in our story last week on HarperCollins’ return to full agency pricing, the company has in fact reached a multi-year agreement with Amazon covering print and digital titles. They said in a statement Monday evening: “HarperCollins has reached an agreement with Amazon and our books will continue to be available on the Amazon print and digital platforms.” Amazon declined to comment. Harper told other retailers last week that the return to agency pricing would go into effect at midnight Pacific time on Monday evening (or, for those keeping track while in London for the Book Fair, 8 AM GMT.) […]