BEA organizers have announced the books to be featured on the convention’s three “buzz” book panels for adult, young adult, and middle grade books. with one panel each day starting on Wednesday. The adult panel is on Wednesday afternoon (May 29), with the YA panel on Thursday morning and the middle grade panel on Friday morning. In one marked variation, the adult panel, which usually comprises mostly fiction, will feature four nonfiction books this year. Adult All Joy and No Fun: The Paradox of Modern Parenthood by Jennifer Senior (Ecco, January 2014) Knocking on Heavens Door: The Path to a […]
Authors
HMH to Pull Second Lehrer Book HOW WE DECIDE From Stores
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt announced Friday that it is “taking…off sale” Jonah Lehrer’s 2009 book HOW WE DECIDE. In an email to the Daily Beast HMH publisher Bruce Nichols said an internal review “uncovered significant problems with the book” and as a result, has “no plans to reissue it in the future.” Nichols added that HMH will “shortly alert accounts about How We Decide and offer to refund returns” — similar to the approach taken when the publisher pulled Lehrer’s third book, IMAGINE, from sale last July, following the discovery of fabricated quotes — but that PROUST WAS A NEUROSCIENTIST, Lehrer’s […]
Fountain, Solomon, Caro Among NBCC Winners
The National Book Critics Circle Award winners were announced Thursday evening: FICTION Ben Fountain, Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk (Ecco) NONFICTION Andrew Solomon, Far From the Tree (Scribner) BIOGRAPHY Robert A. Caro, The Passage of Power: The Years of Lyndon Johnson (Knopf) AUTOBIOGRAPHY Leanne Shapton, Swimming Studies (Blue Rider Press) CRITICISM Marina Warner, Stranger Magic: Charmed States and the Arabian Nights (Belknap Press) POETRY D. A. Powell, Useless Landscape, or A Guide for Boys (Graywolf Press) Some of the suspense was deflated when, a little less than an hour before the NBCC ceremony began at 6 PM, NYT publishing reporter […]
People, Etc.
Patricia Arancibia has joined Apple as head of the iBookstore’s European operations. Previously she was editorial director, International Acquisition & Relations – International Digital Content at Barnes & Noble. In the UK, PFD agent Robert Caskie is taking on the additional new role of chief operating officer of The Rights House Group. Publicity director at Profile Books Ruth Killick is leaving the publisher after 11 years to establish her own PR firm in Bristol this May. Writer, educator and activist Monica Carter, has been named the Lambda Literary Foundation’s LGBT Writers in Schools program coordinator. The trickling of BEA author breakfast […]
People, Etc.
At the Random House Publishing Group, Melissa Milsten has been named director, partnerships and business development, reporting to Allison Dobson. In her new role Milsten will focus on developing long-term relationships with consumer brands and products to expand the audience for RHPG authors, increase marketing, publicity, and digital reach, and develop new revenue streams. Diana Coglianese has been promoted to editor for Knopf and Pantheon. Last Friday Hastings “dismissed 14 mid-level to executive employees” in order to cut their administrative costs. CEO and chairman John Marmaduke has relinquished the presidency, promoting Alan Van Ongevalle to president and chief operating officer as […]
Bookselling: WSJ on ResultSource and Paid Bestsellers; UK Indies Decline
The old saw of authors “buying” their way onto bestseller lists through carefully timed bulk orders gets a fresh twist in Friday’s WSJ, which reports on the San Diego-based company ResultSource. The marketing firm, according to the paper, charges authors “thousands of dollars for its services” to buy copies of the authors’ own books–mostly as pre-orders–to boost opening week sales (and many of those copies are then returned). The service is particularly popular for business book authors, who can monetize the “bestseller” credit (even when it’s a single week on the list) for years at speaking engagements and other lucrative […]