Flatiron Books president and publisher Bob Miller addressed the “backlash” against Jeanine Cummins’ AMERICAN DIRT in a letter Wednesday afternoon cancelling her book tour due to “our concerns about safety.” He notes, “Based on specific threats to booksellers and the author, we believe there exists real peril to their safety.” The cancellation looks to be immediate, starting with tonight’s planned event at Book Passage in Corte Madera, CA, which the store now lists as cancelled. Instead, they “will be organizing a series of townhall meetings, where Jeanine will be joined by some of the groups who have raised objections to […]
Archives for January 2020
People, Etc.
Harper Collins ANZ ceo James Kellow is stepping down after eight years in the role. Kellow joined the company in 2008 as sales director. Jim Demetriou will succeed him on March 3. He is currently group sales and marketing director at Allen & Unwin. Harper Collins UK ceo Charlie Redmayne said of Kellow: “James is one of the most experienced people in the industry and I would like to thank him for the significant contribution he has made to the company and I wish him every success with his future plans.” He said of Demetriou, “Jim is widely respected across […]
2019 Diversity Study Offers a More Comprehensive Baseline
The 2019 Lee & Low Diversity Baseline Survey results are in, and “the field is just as White today as it was four years ago,” write Jason Low and Hannah Ehrlich in their analysis of the data. But that data pool itself presents a much broader, richer understanding of who works in publishing than their first landmark effort from 2015. Through expansive outreach by Lee & Low, the new survey garnered over twice as many responses (7,893 responses in 2019, versus 3,706 in 2015), across 153 companies, this time including university presses and literary agencies, too, along with all of […]
Quarto Turned Down A £20 Million Cash Buyout Offer
Debt-ridden Quarto Publishing turned down a buyout offer from US investor and former hedge fund executive Richard Hurowitz multiple times last year, rejecting his proposals in early October and again in mid-November, the FT reported. Hurowitz offered 100 pence a share, or approximately £20.5 million, and was advised by investment bank Greenhill. Though desperate for funds, Quarto rejected his offer without notifying their public investors. Hurowitz’s offer was — and remains — well above Quarto’s stock price, since the market doubts whether the company is viable. Quarto has roughly $54 million due in bank debt and another $13 million short-term […]
Next Week’s Bestellers
We told you last week in our first experimental post that BookStat.com showed online pre-orders for AMERICAN DIRT of 9,190 hardcovers; 10,436 ebooks; and 3,088 audiobooks. From publication day through Saturday June 25, to align with bestseller lists, BookStat shows online sales of another 8,913 copies, ebook sales of 10,971 units, and digital audio sales of 13,623. Since Bookstat is monitoring online print sales for Amazon only, that suggests the full print sale will register at somewhere between two and three times what they monitor — so, with pre-orders included since that’s how bestseller lists work in opening week, a […]
People, Etc.
Helen Richard O’Hare will join Mulholland Books and Little, Brown as editor starting February 3. She was formerly associate editor at Putnam. Randi Kramer has been promoted to assistant editor at Celadon Books. At St. Martin’s Meghan Harrington has been promoted to publicist and Clare Mauer to associate publicist. At Scholastic Trade, Mary Kate Garmire has joined as production editor. She was previously development editor at Oxford University Press. Jake Snyder has joined as production editor. He was previously at SaveAround where he managed the production of fundraising publications. Shannon Pender has been promoted to marketing associate, young adult. Caroline Noll becomes […]