Jessica Friedman has joined Sterling Lord Literistic as agent. She was previously at The Wylie Agency.
Sara O’Keeffe has joined Aevitas Creative Management UK as an agent, based in London, representing literary and commercial fiction, along with some middle-grade and YA fiction. She was previously publishing director of Corvus.
Megan Fishman has been promoted to vp/associate publisher, publicity for Catapult/Counterpoint Press/Soft Skull.
At Random House, Cindy Murray has been promoted to senior publicity director, Christian Publishing/Forum. Jordan Pace and Erin Richards have each been promoted to associate publicist.
Imprints
Emily Books is shutting down after their final title publishes on March 3. Coffee House Press will continue to publish the titles that the two had partnered on. Titles stocked by Emily Books alone will remain available for sale, and ebooks purchased from their store will remain active and available.
Emily Books was founded by Emily Gould and Ruth Curry as an ebooks website in 2011. Curry and Gould note in the announcement, “While we’re thrilled that the voices and stories we’ve been championing for years have lately become more ‘marketable,’ it’s made it harder for us to compete with publishers whose resources outstrip ours by many orders of magnitude…. It is now far more difficult for us to make the case to authors that accepting a small advance now might be good for their careers down the road. We’re in awe of independent publishers who make it work long-term, and we look forward to continuing to cheer them on from the sidelines.”
They say: “We are immensely grateful to everyone who has been a part of this project in any way. If you ever bought a book, contributed to our Kickstarter, or participated in any of our events, you are a part of this piece of literary history, and we could not have done any of it without you.”
Controversies
Regarding Monday’s meeting between Macmillan leadership and Latinx activist organizations #DignidadLiteraria and Presente.org, a representative from Flat Iron Books confirmed that the publisher agreed to the terms described in the organizations’ press release. Terms included a commitment to “substantially increasing Latinx representation…including authors, titles, staff, and its overall literary ecosystem”; creating an action plan within 90 days for implementing changes; and regrouping within 30 days to assess progress.
Tips
To help members make the most of our resources, we have posted a Writer’s Guide to PM, answering a number of frequently asked questions about researching agents, deals and more. Also check out our brief video tutorial on how to use the Publishers Marketplace website. This short screencast highlights some of the most popular features of PM, as well as a few less-known but useful gems, to help you learn how to maximize our website’s benefits.