Children’s book literary agent and packager Danielle Smith, founder of Lupine Grove Creative, has reportedly been accused of fraudulent deals with her clients and she has closed her agency. In a post to a private Facebook group (also then shared on Twitter) author Heidi Heilig wrote that “it was discovered a couple of days ago that [Smith] forged offer letters to her clients (and counselled her clients not to take them) (i do not know what the end goal was).” Helig says that Smith “has resigned as an agent, and in addition she was fired from Walden Pond Press where she […]
Archives for July 2018
People, Etc.
Mitchell Ivers is leaving Simon & Schuster on August 31 after more than 21 years at the company, most recently as vp, editorial director of Threshold Editions (though the imprint is not mentioned in the announcement), to write a book “inspired by his recent trip to Israel and Palestine” and to explore publishing opportunities. Ivers joined Simon & Schuster in 1997. In a note to staff, Jonathan Karp remarked on Ivers’ years of “major bestsellers and consummate professionalism” and his “his open-mindedness and courageous support of writers of all voices.” Including, though also not mentioned, the ill-fated Milo Yiannopoulos project. That […]
A Romance Publishing Preview, Part One
We asked sisters Bea and Leah Koch, who own The Ripped Bodice in Los Angeles, the only exclusively romance bookstore in the country, to write the seasonal preview for our recently-published sampler, Buzz Books 2018: Romance (free downloads are available for Amazon Kindle, Barnes & Noble Nook, Apple’s iBooks, and Google Play). In addition to the 14 featured pre-publication excerpts in the sampler (noted in boldface below), the Kochs picked a wealth of noteworthy forthcoming romance titles to look for. These posts will present abbreviated versions of their full preview, which you can read in the free sampler. Today’s post focuses contemporary romance; tomorrow we will […]
People, Etc.
Kristin Fassler is joining Atria Publishing Group in the newly created position of vice president, director of integrated marketing on August 1. She was most recently vice president, director of marketing at Random House, overseeing the Ballantine Bantam Dell imprint. Dana Trocker, director of marketing, will move to Atria from the Simon & Schuster trade imprint, reporting to Fassler. Also reporting to Fassler will be Atria’s two deputy directors of publicity, David Brown and Lisa Sciambra; associate director of publicity Yona Deshommes; and assistant director of publicity Ariele Fredman. Paul Olsewski, vice president, director of publicity, will be leaving Atria, and the role […]
Investor Schottenfeld Tries A Little Agitation Again with Barnes & Noble Stock
Investment groups associated with hedge fund manager Richard Schottenfeld acquired holdings in Barnes & Noble sufficiently as of July 12 to file with the SEC, indicating control of more than 5 percent of the company’s stock. In this case they control 4.16 million shares, or 5.68 percent of the bookseller’s shares, and according to the filing they are holding a number of options, hoping for a boost in the share price. Schottenfeld has invested in Barnes & Noble before; back in late 2012 he claimed to have a “significant ownership interest” in the company (but not big enough to declare to […]
Ondaatje, Kushner, Powers Among the Booker Longlisted
The Guardian posted the Man Booker Prize longlist early, in advance of Wednesday’s scheduled announcement, and then promptly took it down. But the list survived in the Google cache and across social media (and now is public). Titles from US authors include Rachel Kushner’s The Mars Room (Jonathan Cape/Scribner), Nick Drnaso’s Sabrina (Granta/Drawn and Quarterly) — the first graphic novel to grace a Booker list — and Richard Powers’s The Overstory (William Heinemann/Norton). The only previous Booker winner on the longlist is Michael Ondaatje for Warlight (Jonathan Cape/Knopf), while the other Canadian listed is Giller Prize winner Esi Edugyan for Washington Black (Serpent’s Tail/Knopf). Two debut novels are […]