Erica Rand Silverman will join Stimola Literary Studio as a senior agent on July 1 after eight years at Sterling Lord Literistic. She will continue to represent children’s literature, picture books through YA, and the occasional adult nonfiction in the areas of parenting, humor and wellness.
Patrick Walsh is leaving Conville & Walsh (now owned by Curtis Brown UK) to start PEW Literary Agency. Conville and Walsh will continue to represent foreign rights to Walsh’s authors, and Curtis Brown UK will continue to sell film/tv rights for the new agency. Walsh says: “I have loved working with the team at Curtis Brown…. For me the drive for this new company has simply been to explore new pastures.” He adds, “I enjoy the start-up energy and excitement and I would like to spend more time thinking about what areas and books I would like to work in. Everyone at Curtis Brown couldn’t have been more lovely about it.”
Jen Marshall has joined Kuhn Projects and Zachary Shuster Harmsworth as an agent, based in the two firms’ shared New York City offices and in Massachusetts. She has worked at Vintage and Anchor for 18 years, where she will continue as publicist at large.
Quynh Do is rejoining Norton, as a trade editor focusing on science, math, philosophy, and natural history. She was an associate editor in Norton’s college division before moving to Basic Books.
Cecelia Cancellaro, formerly of Idea Architects, has launched Word, providing a range of publishing-related services including literary representation, book development, developmental and structural editing, and editorial and project management.
Australia’s Xoum Publishing announced the launch of literary imprint Brio, to be headed by Alice Grundy in the newly created position of associate publisher. She will join the company in July from Giramondo and the new imprint launches in September with Anjum Hasan’s novel The Cosmopolitans.
Retired bookseller Joe Shuman, 88, died at home in Rockville, MD of complications from Alzheimer’s disease on June 6. Shuman was a co-owner of Washington, DC’s Trover Shop from 1958 until it closed in 2009, making it “into a fixture on Capitol Hill, stocking the shelves of neighborhood homes, congressional offices and Library of Congress reading rooms for half a century,” and “a gathering place for political junkies of all persuasions.”