Penguin USA ceo David Shanks is PW’s “person of the year,” cited “for his leadership role in building a solid foundation for his company while making the necessary investments and changes to build for the future.” Rochelle Bourgault joins Shambhala Publications this month, working mainly on their new Roost Books imprint. She will report to Sara Bercholz and work closely with Roost editor Jennifer Urban-Brown. Bourgault was formerly an editor at Quarry Books. Amanda Knox’s co-defendant (and former boyfriend) Raffaele Sollecito, exonerated of murder charges and released from prison at the same time as Knox last month, has signed with […]
Authors
S&S Releases eBook Edition of Fahrenheit 451
Science fiction writer Ray Bradbury has finally overcome his longstanding aversion to digital books and authorized an ebook edition of his most famous novel, FAHRENHEIT 451, which Simon & Schuster released Tuesday. The ebook deal comes as part of a new publishing agreement brokered by Bradbury’s agent Michael Congdon with S&S that includes all English-language print and digital formats of FAHRENHEIT 451 in North America, and also includes English-language mass-market rights in North America to Bradbury’s THE MARTIAN CHRONICLES and THE ILLUSTRATED MAN, both of which will be reissued in March. The ebook edition of FAHRENHEIT, originally published in 1953, […]
An Off-Catalog Pelecanos Book, Priced for Discovery
Reagan Arthur Books is trying an interesting strategy with an unexpected George Pelecanos novel, which they will publish next January 23. The 272-page page WHAT IT WAS is a stand-alone, which will be published as a 99-cent ebook and a $9.99 trade paperback. And for staunch fans, they are producing a limited-edition, signed and slip-cased hardcover for $35, with all three editions releasing at the same time. (The new title was quietly listed on bookselling sites in August, though we didn’t realize the interesting price promotion strategy until this week.) Arthur says they wanted Pelecanos’ next regularly-published hardcover to be […]
People, Etc.
John Hawkins, who owned and operated the literary agency John Hawkins & Associates, died November 13 at the age of 72. The cause of death was not immediately available. Hawkins joined Paul R. Reynolds Inc., established by his wife’s grandfather, in 1966, became president of the agency in 1980 and changed its name to John Hawkins & Associates in 1985. Among his current and former clients are James Clavell, Alex Haley, Gail Godwin, E. Lynn Harris, Thomas McGuane, Harry Crews and Joyce Carol Oates, who said in a statement that Hawkins “was a beloved friend to his writers, warmly sympathetic, […]
People, Etc.
Updating our National Book Awards coverage from Thursday, Bloomsbury upped its reprint order for fiction winner SALVAGE THE BONES by Jesmyn Ward to 50,000 copies, while Norton told us a reprint for nonfiction winner SWERVE by Stephen Greenblatt was “already underway” and will now comprise approximately 50,000 copies as well. The National Endowment for the Arts have awarded their 2012 literature fellowships in creative writing, with Eula Biss, Tayari Jones, Joseph O’Neill, Jennifer Haigh, and Benjamin Percy among the recipients of the $25,000 grants. Full list N+1 editor and novelist Keith Gessen was among those arrested as part of yesterday’s […]
Independents Triumph At National Book Awards
The National Book Awards turned into a celebration of independence of sorts on Wednesday night, with independent publishers issuing three of the four medal winners, and a special award for service to the American literary community going to independent bookseller and former ABA president Mitchell Kaplan from Miami’s Books & Books. In a similar but different vein, the AP called the evening’s festivities “a gilded tribute to the 99 percent. Stories of resilience in the face of poverty, displacement and disappearance were awarded Wednesday night as hundreds of writers, editors, publishers and other industry officials gathered under the 70-foot ceilings of […]