Pilar Queen has joined the publishing department at United Talent Agency, after more than a decade at McCormick Literary.
Maureen Moretti has joined P.S. Literary Agency as associate agent based in New York.
At Trident Media Group, Adrienne Santamaria will expand her responsibilities to represent foreign rights for a broad range of adult titles, as well as all children’s and YA projects, and all Asian co-agented markets. Jennifer Helinek has been promoted to foreign rights agent, overseeing other co-agented markets, backlist, and e-book originals.
Sasha Henriques joined Random House Children’s as an associate editor. (She was at Jimmy Patterson.)
Anthony Cacace has joined the Simon & Schuster Speakers Bureau as a lecture agent. He was previously with Gotham Artists. Emily Varga will join as coordinator, starting April 15. Both will report to Erin Simpson, director of the Simon & Schuster Speakers Bureau.
Macmillan announced a number of promotions within its sales team: Brian McSharry, to vp of sales operations; Andie Anderson, to senior client operations and account manager; Jaime Bode, to national accounts manager; Vanessa Torres, to assistant client account manager; Eunice Pak, to national accounts sales coordinator; Kristen Bonanno, to national accounts sales coordinator; Emily Day, to library marketing coordinator, specializing in YA; and Jake Swirsky, to sales coordinator.
Faye Bi will join Bloomsbury Children’s as publicity director. Previously she was publicity manager at Holiday House.
At Workman, Emily Weldon has been promoted to associate publicist.
Keely Platte joined BookSparks as publicity director. She was formerly executive publicist at Tarcher Perigee and most recently principal at Keely Platte Public Relations.
Awards
Flemish author Bart Moeyaert won the Astrid Lingren Memorial Award for children’s literature, cited for his “condensed and musical language [that] vibrates with suppressed emotions and unspoken desires.”
The shortlist was announced for the Swansea University International Dylan Thomas Prize for young writers. The winner will be named May 16.
Acquisitions
Scholastic completed the acquisition of a majority ownership position in Make Believe Ideas Limited, the UK-based publisher of children’s books founded by Jo Bicknell in 2004, for an undisclosed sum. (This continues a formal partnership begun in 2015, when Scholastic purchased a minority stake.) “In less than four years, our collaboration has produced a bestselling Scholastic-branded line of books for early childhood with beautiful, inventive elements that invite kids to touch, play, discover and learn,” said Ellie Berger, Scholastic evp and president, Trade Publishing. “With 11 million books already in print, we look forward to expanding our publishing program to engage and inspire even more children around the world.”
Forthcoming
Former Ohio governor John Kasich‘s next book, IT’S UP TO US: Ten Little Ways We Can Bring About Big Change will be published October 22 by Hanover Square Press.