Seth Russo, vice president and director of international sales at Simon & Schuster will retire on April 20, after 35 years in international sales. Executive director, global digital and international sales Colin Shields will take on the direct, day-to-day responsibility for the international sales channel. Newly reporting to him will be Rema Badwan and Danielle Cumbo, and Christina “Chrissy” Festa will add audio sales to her portfolio as director, audio, digital and online sales.
The New York Times Book Review is adding a new monthly column about graphic novels and comics. The columnists will be Hillary Chute, author of Why Comics? From Underground to Everywhere, and Ed Park, author of the novel Personal Days and a founding editor of The Believer.
Maris Kreizman, formerly editorial director of Book of the Month Club, will help Buzz Feed launch the book club they have been talking to everyone about this summer.
At Tarcher Perigee, Roshe Anderson has been promoted to assistant marketing manager and Alexandra Bruschi to publicist.
Ana M. Jimenez-Moreno will join Ohio State University Press as acquisitions editor for literary and cultural studies, starting April 2. Previously she was a editorial assistant at University of Notre Dame Press.
Karen Allman will join Rowman & Littlefield as vp, sales and marketing at the beginning of April, based in Lanham, MD. She was most recently vp, business development at Blackboard Inc.
Imprints
Harper Christian is launching a new UK-based Christian imprint called Harper Inspire. The imprint will produce five books a year and also manage titles from the Marshall Pickering imprint, previously housed within Zondervan. Rose Sandy will lead as affiliate publisher, and the first five titles will be released together on June 28.
Separately, Bonnier will close its Australian children’s publishing arm “in response to changing market conditions,” with 35 (out of 36) staffers set to be laid off, the Bookseller reports. In addition, though the company said it “remained committed” to its Australian adult non-fiction and fiction divisions, its Echo Publishing adult lists will be consolidated under its Bonnier Zaffre UK division.
Harassment Files
In a round up piece on “cancelled deals and pulped books,” the NYT notes that some publishers, “including Hachette Book Group, are expanding the use of morals clauses and ‘author conduct’ clauses in book contracts, which allow publishers to cancel book deals if the author is credibly accused of unethical behavior. But some editors and publishers say privately that it’s difficult to impose a code of conduct on writers, who are not their employees.”
Awards
Jacqueline Woodson has been named the recipient of the 2018 Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award ($613,000) for children’s and young adult literature.
Columbia Journalism School and the Nieman Foundation for Journalism announced the winners of the 2018 Lukas Prize Project Awards. The J. Anthony Lukas Book Prize was awarded to Amy Goldstein for Janesville, while the Mark Lynton History Prize was given to Stephen Kotkin’s Stalin. Chris Hamby’s Soul Full Of Coal Dust (Little, Brown) and Rachel Louise Snyder’s No Visible Bruises (Bloomsbury) won the J. Anthony Lukas Work-In-Progress Awards.
The Dylan Thomas Prize announced its shortlist, with the winner to be named on May 10:
Kumakanda, Kayo Chingonyi
Her Body & Other Parties, Carmen Maria Machado
First Love, Gwendoline Riley
Conversations with Friends, Sally Rooney
Idaho, Emily Ruskovich
My Absolute Darling, Gabriel Tallent