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 […]
Book Fairs
Frankfurt Opening Is Both Sunny and Stormy
The Frankfurt Book Fair officially opened on Tuesday morning (though the halls don’t open until Wednesday), presenting a study in contrasts. While the Fair celebrates its 70th anniversary, this year’s opening press conference was held in their new space-age Pavilion, dubbed everything from “a bright wooden skeleton covered with canvas reminiscent of a ship’s belly” to “a snazzy wooden UFO, which landed in the middle of the exhibition grounds.” For the average international visitor, the biggest contrast might simply be the weather, with the forecast calling for unseasonable highs of 75 degrees every day of the show. A robust economy […]
Things Will Move Around Again At Frankfurt, Starting Next Year
The Frankfurt Book Fair announced some changes to expect starting with next year’s show, in 2019, due to construction at the fairgrounds. Floor 6.3, which has served as the agents’ center for a number of years — and finally had the agents next to (or actually above) North American publishers as of 2015 — is being turned into “a technical control center.” So the agents will be moved away from everyone else again, moving into the historic Festhalle near the fair’s main City entrance. (The Festhalle is the attractive older, roundish building that traditionally has not been utilized for the […]
AAP Celebrates Copyright and Freedom of Expression
The AAP (Association of American Publishers) held its annual meeting in the Penguin Random House Building on Thursday afternoon, using the occasion to underscore the organization’s new focus. As PRH ceo and current AAP chair explained, “We wanted to refocus AAP on two core priorities: Copyright protection, the publishers’ lifeblood, and…the value proposition of publishing for society…as well as our collective contribution to the economy.” AAP’s ceo Maria Pallante was hired with that focus in mind, “to lead in the areas of law and policy,” and she in turn emphasized the subtleties of enacting that mission. While “copyright is absolutely […]
People, Etc.
At the Penguin Random House US Finance Group, Justine LeCates has been appointed vice president, director of US finance. In the newly created position, she’ll be responsible for overseeing the US division’s financial planning & reporting, analysis and financial Systems. Yvonne Ricciuti has been promoted to senior director of financial systems. In the Random House Publishing Group publicity department, Jennifer Garza has been promoted to director of publicity, Ballantine Bantam Dell; Greg Kubie becomes associate director of publicity; and Dhara Parikh moves up to senior publicist. Emily Ritter has joined Simon & Schuster Children’s as digital & social marketing manager. She was most recently marketing manager at […]
Despite Organizers’ Efforts, Bookseller and Librarian Attendance Fell at Book Expo
For years now as Book Expo has plainly diminished in actual scale — primarily show floor exhibition space and attendees — organizers have understandably shied away from much discussion of the core data, bringing to bear a series of efforts to “reimagine” the show and drive the best possible experience for those who do participate. (Including, perhaps, imagining that the show could be as big or as important as it once was.) But numbers are numbers, and we like to keep ours as straight and clear as possible. Show officials released some preliminary data about this year’s show. Because there […]