Carla Valadez is serving as Coffee House Press’s interim managing director, following the departure of Chris Fischbach.
Mollie Reid has been promoted to associate publicist at Penguin Press.
At Bertelsmann, cfo Bernd Hirsch “is leaving the company at his own request to pursue new professional challenges.” CEO of the Arvato Financial Solutions division Rolf Hellermann will take over as cfo January 1 and will join the executive board.
National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature Jason Reynolds will serve as host the National Book Awards on November 18.
Bookselling
Friends and supporters of Talking Leaves bookstore were “worried about losing a Buffalo institution” and started a GoFundMe campaign on the store’s behalf. They aim to raise $300,000: “There are many ways to support the store, but we thought that this GoFundMe campaign would provide immediate help with the debt and loss of income that is threatening the store’s survival.”
Best ofs
WH Smith named Richard Osman‘s The Thursday Murder Club their Book of the Year.
Corporate
Tik Tok owner ByteDance is paying $170 million to acquire an 11 percent minority stake in Chinese ereading company Zhangyue, makers of the iReader mobile reading app. They are reported to 170 million monthly users.
Also in ereading, note that Amazon recently indicated the awkwardly-named (and conceived) Kindle Owner’s Lending Library — aka KOLL — will be retired on January 4: “We will no longer offer KOLL beginning January 4th, 2021. Customers may continue reading books they previously borrowed from KOLL. You will earn royalties for any KENP Read from these KOLL borrows.”
Quad released its full earnings report for the quarter ended September 30, with sales from the now-sold book printing business of $13 million, down from $57 million last year. The book business had a pre-tax loss of $(.5) million, improved from $(111.6) million last quarter. Financials on the October 31 sale of the two remaining book production plants to Bertelsmann-owned Berryville Graphics have not been disclosed yet, but should be included in their fourth quarter earnings filing.
Call for Previews
Once again we are finalizing our latest Buzz Books 2021: Spring/Summer sampler, with include extensive seasonal preview/overview listings of notable titles on the way. We compile these big roundups by looking at publisher catalogs, our own comprehensive monthly lists of significant forthcoming books; hints from our substantial flow of deal reports; aggregation of “anticipated books” lists from other publications; word-of-mouth within the industry; and more.
If you have notable spring/summer titles you would like to have considered for the preview list — particularly ones you are concerned we might have missed from the regular signals, along with drop-ins and rescheduled releases — now is your chance to let us know. Please email us your suggestions no later than November 12, and make sure to include author, title, imprint, and pub date. Send to Erin Somers (erin@publishersmarketplace.com).