With dealmakers converging on the London Book Fair next week, it’s time for us to bring our traditional dose of statistically-based reality to the frenzy of pre-Fair deals coverage. As always, this is preliminary, with two more business days of deal reports to log before we provide you fuller analysis next Tuesday. So far, the deals market is looking modest, and in line with recent trends: – Overall pre-LBF dealmaking in the US (measured over the five weeks ahead of the fair, starting Monday, February 4) is on trajectory to be even with or slightly below last year’s level. – […]
Book Fairs
People: Holt’s EIC Comes From Within
Following the departure of Gillian Blake for Crown Trade in early December, new Holt publisher Ben Schrank has filled the editor-in-chief position from within the company. Executive editor Serena Jones is being promoted to editor in chief. Metropolitan Books publisher and co-founder Sara Bershtel moves up to senior vice president (with Maggie Richards being named a vice president). Schrank notes the Elton John autobiography releases this fall, with the publisher confirming a worldwide publication date of October 15. Publishing director at Penguin Press UK Helen Conford will move to Profile Books in May, where she will take over from Andrew […]
ABA Town Hall: Stock Shortages, Minimum Wage, and More
On the final day of Winter Institute, ABA ceo Oren Teacher announced that next year’s event will take place in Baltimore on January 21-24, 2020. On Thursday morning, the ABA Town Hall began with an update from the diversity task force, which will become a permanent committee going forward. The group is working on a range of projects, including developing a mentorship program, creating a glossary of diversity and inclusion terms for booksellers, working with Edelweiss to add filters pertaining to diversity, and more. Afterward, the floor was was opened to booksellers, who raised a range of concerns. Sarah Pishko of […]
Realistic Expectations at Winter Institute
ABA ceo Oren Teicher spoke to international attendees at a lunchtime session on The State of the U.S. Book Industry, as part of Wednesday’s opening day of Winter Institute (Wi14) in Albuquerque, NM. He struck a cautious note that echoed throughout the day, noting that indie booksellers had “a pretty consistent year,” with a 4.9 percent increase in sales, but didn’t see any particular bumps from this year’s blockbusters. He said, “Things are reasonably healthy. We are always cautious…. There’s good news for sure, but it’s also pretty fragile.” Teicher remarked on seeing younger faces among the more than 700 […]
People, Etc.
Alessandra Bastagli has joined Dey Street Books as executive editor. She was previously editorial director of Nation Books. Warren Bass will leave Penguin Press after almost a year to return to the Wall Street Journal’s weekend Review section, “with a nicely tailored portfolio of commissioning and editing big essays that’ll include lots of ongoing interface with the publishing world.” At Atria, Ariele Fredman has been promoted to associate director of publicity, and Alison Hinchcliffe moved up to associate publicist. Katie Zanecchia, formerly a literary agent at Ross Yoon Agency, has joined PEN America as national outreach program director. Pittsburgh former bookseller Mary Alice Gorman, […]
Dealmaking Is Modest Heading into Frankfurt, As Nonfiction and Film/TV Gain
With the Frankfurt Book Fair now officially underway, it’s time for our regular look at dealmaking trends ahead of the show (in the five week period from the day after Labor Day to yesterday). This year’s deal activity has been in line with both recent trends — ahead of the London Book Fair in April major nonfiction deals were robust, with overall US deal volumes just below flat — and long-term patterns, which had pre-FBF deal totals peaking in 2013 and 2014, and declining slightly year-over-year since. As we have seen before, nonfiction volumes remained strong, as fiction deals continue […]