Following a status conference on Tuesday, Judge Deborah L. Boardman set a February 7 hearing on the AAP’s pending motion for a preliminary injunction blocking implementation of Maryland’s new law on library licensing of electronic text. The state of Maryland’s response to the motion is due January 14, with the AAP’s reply due two weeks later.
The Next London Book Fair Issue: Less Space
After being disappointed during the pandemic with stingy, conditional refunds and late cancellation decisions, London Book Fair customers face another issue for 2022: Limited space. Due to construction at the Olympia exhibition center, along with pandemic precautions, there will be less about 20 percent less space available for exhibitors — and similar constraints for rights tables. The rights center will be relocated for the year to the ground floor, with space for only “425 tables compared to just over 500 in 2019.” And “the majority of these tables have been allocated to those who rolled over their investment from 2020.” […]
The Best of the Best Children’s Books of 2021
Once again, we are able to include children’s literature in our annual process of tabulating the consensus Best of the Best Books of the year. Drawing on a slightly smaller group of 18 selective sources in all, this year the data yielded more middle grade picks than in the past (including a nonfiction book, Gary Paulsen’s memoir), with a natural group of top titles there and in young adult, and with a long roster of picture books appearing on the same number of lists: Top Middle Grade Books of the Year The Legend of Aunti Po, Shing Yin Khor Starfish, […]
Corporate: Lagardere Publishing Raises Profit Expectations, and More
Following “decade high” earnings in the first half of the year, Lagardere Publishing said in a release that the division’s “strong sales momentum and product mix” will raise profits “in a more favorable manner than anticipated in the context of the health crisis.” They now expect full-year operating margin of “around 13.5 percent” for the year, up from a previous expectation of 12 percent. For comparison, in 2020 they had operating margin of 10.3 percent, with recurring EBIT of €246 million on sales of €2.384 billion. Through the first nine months of 2021 publishing sales were up 9 percent; if […]
The Top 10 Best of the Best Books of 2021 So Far
As we continue to tabulate the consensus very best books of 2021, the roster has remained one of the most interesting and competitive we have seen in years of aggregating. Distinctions are fine, with all of the top titles receiving similar totals of “picks” from across the lists we monitor. At the very top, works of fiction and nonfiction are closely matched for “book of the year” honors — and across the top 10, the list is more balanced than usual, with five works of nonfiction and six novels. (Eight are from Penguin Random House, with one each from Simon […]
Lagardere Board Prepares for Tender Offer
Ahead of the coming tender offer from Vivendi to buyout the remaining shareholders of Lagardere, the company’s board appointed an ad hoc committee. Soon that committee will recommend “an independent expert in accordance with the General Regulations of the French Financial markets authority.” Separately, Joseph Oughourlian has resigned from the board now that his company Amber Capital has sold their shares to Vivendi.