Malcolm Edwards, former Gollancz chair and consultant publisher at Orion who left Hachette UK in May after 43 years at the company, will join Welbeck Publishing in September to serve as publisher of André Deutsch. He will “focus on resurrecting and reviving the Deutsch fiction backlist, alongside developing a new front list strategy which will concentrate on publishing new titles in some of his key areas of expertise: crime, thriller, science fiction, fantasy and horror.” Executive director Mark Smith says in the announcement: “Malcolm’s appointment allows us to begin to reinvent, republish and resurrect titles from high-quality authors that André Deutsch and Diana Athill assembled over the course of the company’s history. Alongside this backlist refresh, Malcolm will establish a new front list identity for the imprint, concentrating on the areas in which he has been so successful over his career.”
Athena Bryan has joined Melville House as editor. She previously worked at Public Affairs.
Bookselling
Further to our report from earlier this month, Amazon has confirmed that the hiring underway for a new Nashville physical store is for another Amazon Books outlet, a 4,600-square-foot store in the Mall at Green Hills. (As reminder, new stores of some kind of are in progress for Houston and Detroit as well.)
San Francisco’s Books Inc. in Laurel Village reopens today after a remodel.
Context
The NYT is looking for a new publishing reporter. The wording of the listing says a lot about how the paper already views us, “A beat we see as encompassing news about the industry; analysis of how books, publishers and readers are changing; profiles of editors, agents and authors; and trends in book retailing, ecommerce and intellectual life. That means covering the booming audiobook world and the ways in which books intersect with podcasting, YouTube and every facet of Silicon Valley. It means looking at who gets published and why, what sells and who is reading which books on which platforms. This reporter will cover where the money gets spent: major deals, the books that sell and that books that fail to sell despite outsize advances. From breaking news to enterprise to investigations, the publishing reporter will cover an industry that wields enormous cultural and political influence despite the economic headwinds it faces.”