At Chronicle Books, AiLing Tjan has been promoted to accounting supervisor, while Barrett Hooper is now senior financial analyst and Christina Mott moves up to distribution client account manager.
Ingram Content Group has tapped poetry writer and bookseller Stephen Sparks to launch a poetry newsletter called Little Infinite. Sparks owns Point Reyes Bookshop in Pt. Reyes, CA, and has contributed to a number of literary outlets including the Paris Review Daily, Tin House, Music & Literature magazine, BOMB and Lithub.
Imprints
Bonnier Publishing is expanding their Igloo Books mass market line, setting up a US version, led by Jeremy Nurnberg, now director of sales, North America for Igloo. He reports to both Bonnier Publishing USA ceo Shimul Tolia and Igloo Books ceo Dan Shepherd. They plan “a dedicated editorial and design team producing a list of over 150 titles in the first year” that will “focus specifically on the US and Canadian markets, and Nurnberg will “also lead a new North American based sales force, with an aggressive recruitment that will bring in multiple new sales positions covering every retail sector.”
Nurnberg was formerly senior director of North American sales at Parragon. Shepard says in the announcement, “We see a very bright future ahead with the establishment of the new US imprint, Igloo Books, part of Bonnier Publishing USA. As our growth continues globally, it is a natural next step to build a North American team who will focus 100 percent on the needs of the US consumer. We look forward to working with retail partners to bring the list to market in the coming months and years.” Bonnier bought Igloo in 2014, when the company had annual sales of approximately £30 million. (Today’s press release says Igloo now does $60 million a year in business.)
Separately, Hachette Audio is partnering with Wattpad under the banner Hachette Audiobooks: Powered by Wattpad. They plan to produce 50 audiobooks based on Wattpad stories over the next year, launching in summer 2017.
Obituary
Henry S. Lodge, diagnostician, Columbia Medical School professor, and co-author of the Younger Next Year series, died on Friday of prostate cancer. The series is reported to have 2 million copies in print, with translations in 21 languages. He is survived by the agent and editor, his life partner Laura Yorke, as well as his two daughters.
Awards
Three books were awarded the 2017 Bancroft Prize in American History and Diplomacy:
The Other Slavery, by Andrés Reséndez (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt)
Blood in the Water, by Heather Ann Thompson (Pantheon)
Remaking the American Patient, by Nancy Tomes (University of North Carolina Press)