Quirk Books has promoted Brett Cohen to president and Jason Rekulak as publisher, effective immediately. Rekulak has been at the company 13 years, most recently as editor-in-chief, while Cohen has been at Quirk for 12 years. In addition, David Borgenicht will assume the role of owner/CEO of Quirk Productions (the parent company of Quirk Books), with a focus on development partnerships in film, television, and digital media. Borgenicht said about the double promotion: “Individually, Jason and Brett have brought their passion, ingenuity, and leadership to Quirk. Together, they have been the key players behind our ongoing growth and success. Jason […]
Another Opaque Quarter for Harper With News Corp Spinoff Closer to Completion
News Corp. reported third quarter earnings after the close of the market Wednesday and once again the company disclosed nothing in particular about HarperCollins. Notably, this time around it didn’t even merit an adjective. (Harper itself characterized the previous quarters as “favorable”: before that, it was “solid,” “challenging,” and “terrific” — but this time they declined to comment.) At the larger newspaper publishing unit of which Harper is a small part, sales decreased $87 million to $1.938 billion, while operating income dropped $45 million, to $85 million. The declines owed to another $42 million in costs related to the phone-hacking investigations […]
People: Twelve Adds An Editorial Director, As Does Knopf, and More
Following Deb Futter’s appointment as publisher of Grand Central’s Twelve imprint in April, Sean Desmond will join the line in the new position of editorial director, starting May 28. He is currently an executive editor at Crown. Futter says in the announcement, “When I became Publisher of Twelve, my first order of business was to hire a top-notch editorial director who would work with me to define the next era at Twelve. In Sean Desmond, I could not have found a more perfect fit in terms of acquisitions and vision.” Knopf announced two editorial promotions, both effective immediately. Robin Desser […]
Legal: More on Harper Lee Lawsuit; Hagar Cleared Over 2011 Defamation Suit
Updating our Monday story on the Harper Lee copyright lawsuit, the full complaint depicts the alleged depths of the scheme that Samuel Pinkus is said to have engaged in, along with Lee Ann Winick and Gerald Posner, to mislead Lee and her publishers about the copyright status of TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD. The suit alleges that “Pinkus created several different companies to handle the receipt of royalties and commissions and directed the payment of royalties to a continually changing series of bank accounts” as a bid to avoid the nearly $800,000 in commissions he and his company Veritas Media were required to […]
People, Etc.
Robin Wolfson has been named to the new position of vp, Random House Speakers Bureau, assuming central leadership of the five-year-old division, which has been managed in decentralized fashion up until now, with multiple divisional directors for the company’s different publishing groups. Wolfson’s primary responsibilities are strategic oversight and business development; those divisional directors will continue to report within their groups. Pete Beatty will join Open Road on May 28 as acquisitions director, reporting to Tina Pohlman. He was senior editor at Bloomsbury Press. Beatty is taking over for Stephanie Gorton, who is leaving to pursue a creative nonfiction MFA and will continue […]
Bookselling: Fundraising Campaign for BookCourt North; New Children’s Bookstore in Edgewater, MD; and More
BookCourt in Brooklyn has launched a fundraising campaign on Indiegogo to buy the Bibliobarn in the Catskills and rename it BookCourt North: Bookshop, Event Space, and Writers’ Retreat. Should they raise the $300,000 needed to buy and renovate the Bibliobarn, which opened for business in 1996, BookCourt would convert the second floor into a writers’ retreat, host events on within the barn and on the five acres of land surrounding it, and possibly open a cafe. Current owners H.L & Linda Wilson put the property for sale and hope to move to a nearby Catskills town. Children’s bookstore Edgewater Books […]