Joerg Pfuhl is stepping down as ceo of Holtzbrinck in Germany at the end of June. “After four intensive years, I would like to look for another challenge again and thank all of my colleagues for the good cooperation,” he said in a press release. Managing director for sales, marketing and digital Alexander Lorbeer, who joined Holtzbrinck in September 2018, will take over from Pfuhl.
At Macmillan Audio, Emily Dyer was promoted to marketing manager; Kathryn Carroll to assistant manager, audio publishing; Abigail Starr to associate manager, design; and Hayden Biggs to design associate. Steve Wagner joined as producer.
Chris Bucci has joined Aevitas Creative Management as agent. Previously he was with CookeMcDermid Literary Management.
Former CBS communications Gil Schwartz, who wrote columns and books under the pen name Stanley Bing, humorist and novelist, died Saturday in Santa Monica of natural cause, at 68.
Forthcoming, At Last
Stephenie Meyer‘s MIDNIGHT SUN, a retelling of the Twilight sage from Edward’s perspective, will finally be published by Little, Brown on August 4. The manuscript was leaked online in 2008, at which point Meyer put the project on hold. She “says she’s been writing it on and off for about 14 years while working on other things, USA Today reports in an interview. “Ultimately, though, she says writing Midnight Sun made her a better, more thoughtful writer, as she was forced to consider scenes from other perspectives and better flesh out her supporting characters.” Meyer notes, “I think people are not going to maybe have anticipated exactly what Edward was thinking and doing when he wasn’t onscreen, so to speak. I don’t know if it will be the Edward that they imagined. I think it might be an Edward that’s a lot different than that.”
Bookselling
Tattered Cover plans to move its downtown Denver store in spring 2021 from the current space, which it has occupied since 1994, to a new, smaller space in the new McGregor Square development by the Colorado Rockies’ ballpark. The new store will be 6,000 square feet; the current space occupies 12,500 square feet (after relinquishing over 15,000 square feet on the second floor in 2013).
A Barnes & Noble bookstore in downtown Evanston, IL at Sherman Plaza, has closed. The location will become office for Northwestern Medicine.
Picks
Reese Witherspoon chose The Henna Artist by Alka Joshi as her May book club pick.
Jenna Bush Hager picked Emma Straub‘s All Adults Here for her Today Show Read With Jenna Book Club. The book was also named Barnes & Noble‘s May National Book Club selection.
Apple Books‘ Best of May includes the Straub as well. Also on the list are Patrik Svensson’s The Books of Eels and Mike Jollett’s Hollywood Park, both excerpted and available for download in our Buzz Books 2020 Spring/Summer sampler. The rest of the list:
Big Summer, by Jennifer Weiner
Fair Warning, by Michael Connelly
Hideaway, by Nora Roberts
A Good Marriage, by Kimberly McCreight
The Paladin, by David Ignatius
The Mermaid, the Witch, and the Sea, by Maggie Tokuda-Hall
Beach Read, by Emily Henry
Boys of Alabama, by Genevieve Hudson
Untold Night and Day, by Bae Suah
Funny Weather, by Olivia Laing
Date Me, Bryson Keller, by Kevin van Whye
The Index of Self-Destructive Acts, by Christopher Beha
Real Men Knit, by Kwana Jackson
The WNYC Get Lit With All of It/NYPL book club pick for May is Kate Elizabeth Russell’s My Dark Vanessa.
Awards
The Hans Christian Andersen Awards for lifelong achievement in children’s literature were given to Jacqueline Woodson as author and Albertine of Switzerland as illustrator.
The National Book Foundation’s Innovations in Reading Prize goes to DIBS for Kids, a Nebraska-based literacy nonprofit that provides software “that builds student excitement for reading and helps teachers send home over 80 books with each student, every school year.”