Patricia Hespanha has been appointed executive director of HarperCollins Brasil, responsible for the day-to-day management of operations, establishing strategic direction, and setting the editorial program for profitable business growth. Hespanha, who most recently served as executive director, infrastructure for the Rio 2016 Organizing Committee for Olympic and Paralympic Games, succeeds Antonio Araujo, who will transition to general manager of Nova Fronteira e Petra.
HarperCollins ceo Brian Murray said in the announcement: “I am excited to welcome Patricia to HarperCollins Brasil. She has a proven record of leading organizations to success. HarperCollins remains enthusiastic about the market, and Patricia’s leadership and expertise are complementary to our plans to expand both international and local authors in the region.” Of Araujo’s departure, Murray commented: “I would like to thank Antonio for his service in starting up Harper Collins Brasil over the last year, and his ongoing support during the transition to new leadership. His work and guidance have laid the foundation for HarperCollins Brasil to flourish as we expand our publishing efforts.”
Andra Miller will join Ballantine Bantam Dell as executive editor, reporting to Jennifer Hershey. She spent the past 18 years at Algonquin, most recently as senior editor.
At HarperOne, Gideon Weil has been promoted to editorial director.
Novelist Madison Smartt Bell has joined Ayesha Pande Literary as an affiliate agent, specializing in literary fiction and some YA. He writes: “For most of my thirty-years – so far – as a writer who teaches, I have invested a good deal of time in trying to help beginning writers place their manuscripts. In a few anomalous cases where I could not find an agent for a deserving manuscript I have placed it with an editor myself — then turned the deal over to a full-service agent. More recently it occurred to me that I might accomplish more if instead of operating as agent pro tem and pro bono I simply turned pro.”