At Random House UK division Cornerstone, Heinemann Jason Arthur has been appointed publisher, while Caroline Gascoigne, formerly Hutchinson publishing director, has been appointed to the newly-created role of publisher at large. Harvard Common Press titles will be distributed by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt as of June 1. Bi Feiyu has won the Man Asian Literary Prize for his novel Three Sisters (HMH)Release Julian Barnes has won the David Cohen Prize for lifetime achievement in literature. Toronto mystery bookshop Sleuth of Baker Street will be leaving its longtime location on Bayview Avenue for a smaller location on 907 Milwood Road starting on March 19. Quill […]
Awards
People: O’Callaghan Resigns as HMH CEO, and More
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt ceo Barry O’Callaghan resigned from the company today, though he will remain as a senior advisor. Current cfo Michael Muldowney will serve as interim ceo until a replacement is found. The news comes just a year after the once heavily-leveraged publisher significantly reduced more than $7 billion of debt taken on to acquire first Houghton Mifflin and then Harcourt’s US business in an effective takeover and restructuring by billionaire John Paulson’s hedge fund. Paulson & Co. bought up portions of the company’s distressed debt in order to control the refinancing and conversion to new equity. Callaghan, the […]
A Redesigned Boston Globe Books Section, and More People News
The Boston Globe’s redesigned books section will make its debut on Sunday, March 20, with several additions and changes to its columns, editor Nicole Lamy tells us. Amanda Heller and Barbara Fisher will no longer co-write the “Short Takes” capsule review column; Heller’s last piece appeared on March 6 and Fisher’s on March 13. Replacing them is Kate Tuttle, a freelancer who has contributed to The Washington Post, The Boston Phoenix, Babble and Salon. The Shelf Life column, previously written by Katherine Powers, is now called Word on the Street with a new writer in place. Two new columns – […]
NBCC Awards; New Imprints; and More
The National Book Critics Circle Awards went to: A Visit From the Goon Squad, by Jennifer Egan (Fiction) The Warmth of Other Suns, by Isabel Wilkerson (General Nonfiction) How to Live: Or A Life of Montaigne by Sarah Bakewell (Biography) Half a Life, by Darin Straus (Autobiography) One with Others, by C.D. Wright (Poetry) Lyric Poetry and Modern Poetry — Russia, Poland, and the West, by Claire Cavanaugh (Criticism) NBCC Release Online comedy video site Funny or Die will start a line of books under the banner of Funny or Die Books, starting this July with an e-book of celebrity satire […]
People, Etc.
Jordan Fenn has joined McClelland & Stewart as publisher of a joint Fenn/McClelland & Stewart imprint, which will focus on hockey books. The first title will be the 2011 NHL Stanley Cup Championship book scheduled for this June, with additional new titles are scheduled for this fall and next year. For the past 15 years Fenn was publisher of Fenn Publishing Company, which shut down in the wake of its parent company HB Fenn’s bankruptcy earlier this year. Both the NYT and AP offer extensive obits on Owen Laster, who died yesterday of cancer. In a statement WME literary department head […]
People, Awards, Etc.
Former Executive Vice President and Worldwide Head of Literary Operations for William Morris Agency Owen Laster, 72, died this morning after a short illness. Laster represented a distinguished and diverse roster of bestselling and literary authors, ranging from Ralph Ellison, Chaim Potok, Robert Penn Warren, Gay Talese, Edward Albee, and Gore Vidal, to James Michener, Dominic Dunne, Susan Isaacs, Andrew Grove, William Diehl, and Judith McNaught. A New Jersey native, Laster graduated from Syracuse University, and after serving in the Army worked at William Morris for over forty years. Laura Nolan has joined Paradigm as a literary agent and will […]