Barnes & Noble’s director of digital products Jamie Iannone has left the company and joined Wal-mart as president and ceo of Samsclub.com. The WSJ says he will oversee integrating the Sam’s Club website with Wal-mart’s California-based ecommerce unit as they try to grow online sales. He joined Barnes & Noble in 2009 after serving as vp, search at eBay. Iannone had received $2.87 million in salary and stock awards for the BN fiscal year ending April 2013. McGraw-Hill Education has named David Levin its new president and chief executive officer, effective April. Levin, currently ceo of UBM, succeeds Lloyd “Buzz” […]
Pierce Brown Tops February Library Reads List
The February Library Reads list top pick is RED RISING by Pierce Brown, with the rest of the list featuring: The Good Luck of Right Now, by Matthew Quick This Dark Road to Mercy, by Wiley Cash The Martian, by Andy Weir After I’m Gone, by Laura Lippman Ripper, by Isabel Allende The Ghost of the Mary Celeste, by Valerie Martin The Wife, the Maid, and the Mistress, by Ariel Lawhon The Winter People, by Jennifer McMahon E.E. Cummings: A Life, by Susan Cheever
People
At Scholastic, Durya Aziz has been promoted to svp, international education publisher in the international division. At St. Martin’s Press, Yaniv Soha and Sara Goodman have both been promoted to editor. In the UK, Hodder & Stoughton has promoted Kate Howard to associate publisher. Former poet laureate of New Jersey, author of numerous books of prose, poetry, and criticism, and political activist Amiri Baraka, 79, died Thursday in Newark. He had been hospitalized in December because of an undisclosed illness but a spokesman for his son’s mayoral campaign told the Star-Ledger late last month his condition was improving.
National Book Festival Leaves Mall for Washington Convention Center
The National Book Festival will leave the Mall after 12 years as an outdoor festival and relocate indoors to the Washington Convention Center. As part of the move, first indicated at last September’s event after complaints from the National Park Service over damage to the grass on the Mall, the two-day event will take place over a single day, with additional evening events, and new features that were not allowed previously, such as a possible cooking demonstration area. The Park Service’s deputy superintendent for planning at the National Mall and Memorial Parks Stephen Lorenzetti told the Washington Post: “There are new […]
Soft Holiday Sales for Barnes & Noble Are Still An “Improvement” As Digital Content Falls Again
Barnes & Noble followed up their weak second quarter sales report with some improvement over the following 9-week holiday sales period (through December 28): Same-store sales at the BN superstores and BN.com declined 6.6 percent overall, and 5.5 percent on a comparable-sales basis, at $1.1 billion. But nearly all of the retail decline was due to weaker sales of Nook devices and accessories; “core” store sales were “essentially flat”, down 0.2 percent compared to last year. General book sales probably declined more, since the company points to “strong increases in our juvenile, gift and toys & games categories.” But the […]
People, Etc.
In the UK, Scholastic Children’s Books managing director Hilary Murray Hill is leaving after 8 years at the company to join Egmont UK as managing director in March. Scholastic says they will name a “replacement in due course,” and for now the publishing division will report to co-group managing director Catherine Bell. Annette Pollert has joined Sourcebooks Fire as editorial manager. Previously, she was an editor at Simon Pulse. Shannon O’Neill has joined Lippincott Massie McQuilkin as agent. She was previously editorial director and agent at The Sagalyn Agency. O’Neill will remain based in Washington, DC, focusing on narrative nonfiction, popular science, current […]