Deal Reports Just e-mail to deals@PublishersMarketplace if you aren’t using the online form linked below. Report a deal using the online form The Key As usual, the handy key to our Lunch deal categories. While all reports are always welcome, those that include a category will generally receive a higher listing when it comes time to put them all together. “nice deal” $1 – $49,000 “very nice deal” $50,000 – $99,000 “good deal” $100,000 – $250,000 “significant deal” $251,000 – $499,000 “major deal” $500,000 and up FICTION Debut Former editor at Houghton Mifflin and Da Capo, Wendy Francis’ THREE GOOD […]
People, Etc.
Martin H. Greenberg died June 25 after a long battle with cancer. He was 70 years old. Greenberg founded Green Bay, WI-based book packager Tekno Books, which produces about 150 titles per year and has over 2,300 published books translated into 33 languages, and was a longtime professor and the first Director of Graduate Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay, retiring as Professor Emeritus in 1996. In nearly forty years of working in the publishing field, he also edited hundreds of anthologies, both by himself and with notable partners such as Isaac Asimov, Ed Gorman and Robert Silverberg in […]
Briefs: Amazon Coming to India; Two More Borders Stores to Close in Hawaii
Amazon is about to set up operations in India, possibly within the next six months, having reportedly filled the position of head of book operations there and embarking on a hiring spree for additional positions. Plugged.in Borders will close two more Express stores in Oahu, Hawaii later this year, which will leave only three stores remaining open in the state. 20 staffers will be laid off. “Without rent concessions, which we have been trying to negotiate, they are unprofitable locations,” spokesperson Mary Davis said in an email to the Honolulu Star-Advertiser. “Generally speaking, we try to place impacted employees at […]
Still More on Pottermore: Themed Sony Reader Rumors, and Retailers Express Worry
The expected media frenzy after JK Rowling’s Pottermore announcement Thursday came with the usual hyperbole and breathless talk of how selling ebooks direct will “change” publishing (because one can always extrapolate on the future based on the creative approach of one author, especially one as successful as Rowling in terms of marketing to and reaching readers) or that Rowling blazes a trail for self-publishing, never mind that her main publishers Bloomsbury and Scholastic will receive royalties off of each and every direct ebook sale. More interesting and relevant is how Pottermore affects physical and online retailers whose profits once depended […]
Announcements: Curtis Brown to Represent Ian Fleming Estate, And More
Ian Fleming Publications Ltd has appointed Jonny Geller and Curtis Brown to represent the Ian Fleming James Bond novels and future James Bond literary works worldwide, replacing Simon Trewin and United Agents. Curtis Brown will also represent the James Bond novels written by Kingsley Amis, John Gardner and Raymond Benson as well as translation rights in the Young Bond series by Charlie Higson. Aurum’s previously announced imprint headed up by former Granta staffers Alex Clark and Rosalind Porter will be called Union Books, and they will publish 20 titles a year beginning in January 2012, starting with Donovan Hohn’s MOBY […]
AAP eBook Numbers Rise, Making Up About 19 Percent of April Trade Sales
Monthly ebook sales as measured by the AAP from 14 reporting publishers rose slightly in April to $72.8 million, the second-biggest ebook sales month so far this year after February’s monster month of $90.3 million. Once again, that puts ebooks behind adult trade hardcover ($111.4 million) and trade paperbacks ($95.9 million) for the month, and but this time they comprised just under 19 percent of all trade sales for April. The sales numbers seem to indicate that Random House’s move to the agency model in March (when ebook sales were at $69 million) has been absorbed into the overall ebook […]