Yesterday a variety of Dutch publishers filed objections to the Google Books settlement agreement with the Federal District Court, in similar letters from Leopold/Ploegsma; Querido; SWP; Athenaeum – Polak & Van Gennep; and Nijgh & Van Ditmar, citing many of the same objections as other European publishers that we reported on yesterday. Holland’s Unieboek and Spectrum departed from that form letter and sent a different list of objections, including an assertion that “the division of any income between publishers, authors and translators is currently still unclear to us.” New objections were also filed by Czernin Verlag, Sweden’s Liber, and the […]
Ridge Keeps Trying to Explain What He Wrote; Disavows Flap Copy
Former Secretary of Homeland Security Tom Ridge’s book THE TEST OF OUR TIMES: America Under Siege…And How We Can Be Safe Again (Thomas Dunne Books) has drawn attention primarily for a single passage–and Ridge has been making the press circuit trying to explain that he didn’t mean what people think his words say. Ridge wrote of discussions right before the 2004 presidential election, following the release of a new video from Osama Bin Laden, in which “a vigorous, some might say dramatic discussion ensued. Ashcroft strongly urged an increase in the threat level, and was supported by Rumsfeld. There was […]
People and Bookselling
Two editors at Pocket, including editorial director Maggie Crawford, and an editorial assistant at Simon Spotlight Entertainment were laid off last week, the Observer reports. At Little Brown UK, David Shelley has been promoted to the new position of deputy publisher. French-language bookstore Librairie de France will close at the end of September after 74 years in business at New York’s Rockefeller Center. The store faced a tripling of its rent.NYDN
Europe Objects
It’s a quiet week in most of book publishing but a busy one in the offices of Federal District Court Judge Denny Chin as Friday is the deadline for filing objections to the proposed Google Books settlement agreement. (September 4 is also the deadline for opting out of the settlement entirely.) Until recently, despite the noisy public debate about the sweeping and complex settlement, very few objections of substance had been filed with the court. The most detailed legal objections, covered here previously, were raised by attorney and author Scott Gant in his August 20 filing, while support has come […]
World Almanac Sold
The Weekly Reader Publishing Group, a division of Readers Digest since 2007, has sold the World Almanac imprint to Infobase Publishing, for undisclosed terms. Infobase president Mark McDonnell says in the announcement, “There are few names in reference publishing as well-known as the World Almanac, so when we had opportunity to add it to our existing family of imprints, we moved quickly. The World Almanac has been and will continue to be a powerful name in reference publishing, and we are excited about bringing it forward as an online resource as well.” Infobase’s imprints include Facts On File and Chelsea […]
People: Sheila Lukins, 66, Dies of Brain Cancer
Lukins, the co-author of the Silver Palate Cookbooks and longtime food editor at Parade died Sunday after a brief battle with brain cancer.ParadeLAT obit