Harassment Files Both Target and Walmart said that they will drop Mario Batali‘s products — including his cookbooks — from their stores following extensive accusations of sexual harassment. ABC officially fired Batali from their show “The Chew,” and the Food Network dropped plans to create new episodes of his earlier TV show,”Molto Mario.” On Friday, Batali apologized again in his newsletter: “I have made many mistakes and I am so very sorry that I have disappointed my friends, my family, my fans and my team. My behavior was wrong and there are no excuses.” Bookselling Well-known indie That Bookstore in Blytheville […]
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Publisher of the Penguin Random House Audio Group Amanda D’Acierno has been promoted to executive vice president. At Harper One, Jenn Jensen has been promoted to associate director of marketing. Bonnier will expand their North American publishing operations, adding the Bonnier Zaffre imprint (which publishes authors including Wilbur Smith and Lynda La Plante). Valentina Rice has been hired as vp, sales, marketing & publicity for Bonnier Zaffre in the US, reporting to ceo Mark Smith. Rice spent 15 years at Penguin, most recently as vp, international sales & marketing, before launching her own e-commerce site helping small-batch artisanal food producers get […]
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Kim Thornton has been promoted to senior agent director for Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group, Penguin Random House Speakers Bureau. At Waterbrook Multnomah, Andrew Stoddard has been promoted to the new position of lead acquisitions editor. Amara Hoshijo has been promoted to associate editor and rights manager at Soho Press. The Fred Rogers Company has appointed Rachel Hecht Children’s Scouting as literary scout for television. Harassment Files Executive art director of the Penguin Workshop imprint Giuseppe Castellano resigned from the company, following accusations of sexual harassment by actor Charlene Yi. Castellano posts: “As a result of her online campaign against me, an untenable […]
Barnes & Noble Stock Is So Cheap Even Riggio Is Buying Again
With Barnes & Noble’s stock sinking again after last week’s ever-disappointing quarterly results, chairman Len Riggio stepped in to support the price, buying 1 million shares at a weighted average price of $6.8027 per share. Since 2013 Riggio has been a seller of the shares, not a buyer. (In April 2014 he sold 3.7 million shares in a block trade, claiming it was “part of his long-term financial and estate planning.” At the end of 2013, Riggio and his wife had sold 2 million shares.) Riggio is the beneficial owner of 14 million shares now, or 19.3 percent of shares […]
Corporate: Amazon Tries Digital Stories Again; And More
Amazon is making yet another pass at short-form digital prose after years of failing to establish a market of scale, this time by announcing an imprint of Amazon Publishing called Amazon Original Stories. They will publish short works of fiction and nonfiction that can be read in a single sitting, available for purchase in the Kindle Singles store for $1.99 and free for Prime members. The first two titles, The Sign of the Beast by Joyce Carol Oates and Crown Heights by Colin Warner and Carl King, are already available, with work on deck from W. Kamau Bell, Jade Chang, Eddie Huang, Dean Koontz, and more. […]
Briefs: NYT Lists, Pearson’s Deal for Wall Street English, Waterstones Announces New Stores
People Eva Scalzo has joined Speilburg Literary Agency, representing romance and young adult fiction. Best Of Last Wednesday the NYTBR posted their list of 100 notable books for 2017. That means their top 10 list is due later this week. Former NYT book critic Michiko Kakutani doesn’t have a vote this year, but last week she indicated in a Tweet that three of her “favorite novels” from the year are Lincoln in the Bardo by George Saunders, Exit West by Mohsin Hamid, and Stay with Me by Ayobami Adebayo. Corporate As expected, Pearson has reached a deal to sell their Wall Street English […]