The ABA announced that the top pick for their September Indie Next list is Love on the Brain, by Ali Hazelwood.
Archives for August 2022
Day Four: Dohle and the Documents
As indicated in earlier interim posts, Penguin Random House ceo took the stand for much of Thursday in the A3 antitrust trial. The DOJ’s John Read led the questioning for the first time, and much of his questioning of Dohle was based on, and bounded by, a number of key documents — which meant Dohle’s answers were more direct than many of his predecessors in the trial. The point of the exercise, from the government’s perspective, was to introduce documents that reinforce some of the main arguments they have been trying to establish, for Dohle to confirm and offer context […]
People 8/4
Macmillan announced a number of promotions and new hires.
Dohle on Spiegel & Grau, Advances, and the Bidding Pledge
This is an interim report on Penguin Random House ceo Markus Dohle’s testimony in the A3 antitrust trial on Thursday. This post focuses on some of the learnings less related to the merger itself from the morning: – On the subject of bidding rules, which we already reported on once — regarding allowing S&S and PRH to bid independently outside of auctions, when authors want to move with an option book, Dohle said he and Madeline McIntosh are considering an even bigger change. Dohle said “We are considering — no decision yet — to even broaden the opportunity” that their […]
Day Four: Dohle on the Bidding Policy
Elicited on the stand in PRH ceo Markus Dohle’s antitrust trial testimony was what community members may see as an extension of the previous commitment to treat Simon & Schuster as an external bidder after the merger. Asked by lead DOJ attorney John Read how the policy would apply to one-on-one negotiations — such as situations in which an author wants to move houses from one group to the other — Dohle said, “We’re going to keep that external, too; that’s my understanding.” Pressed on the point by Read regarding direct negotiations and not just competitive bidding situations, such as […]
S&S Sales Rise 34% in Q2
Paramount reported second quarter earnings for the period ended June 30, with Simon & Schuster sales totaling $293 million, up 34 percent from $219 million last year. Operating income was $80 million, compared to $52 million in 2021, a 54 percent increase. According to a memo to staff from ceo Jonathan Karp, each of the company’s four divisions—adult, children’s, audio, and international—grew in the double digits. Sales of backlist titles popular on social media, predominantly “queen of TikTok” Colleen Hoover, drove results. “It Ends with Us, which we first published in 2016, was the bestselling novel in the trade paperback […]