As previewed last week, Grumpy Cat emerged as one of the biggest celebrity draws at BEA last week, with convention-goers lining up by the Chronicle booth for almost two hours. “Just 15 minutes into the event, the crowd was so anxious to get close to Grumpy Cat that the BEA organizers called for two extra security guards to maintain the peace,” the WSJ blogged. By their account the cat, whose actual name is Tardar Sauce, “seemed unphased” and “managed to sleep through most of her event” (though witnesses told us they thought the cat looked drugged rather than just sleepy/grumpy). […]
Deals
People, Etc.
Hannah Wood has moved to Harper as an associate editor. Isaac Fitzgerald will join McSweeney’s Publishing as publicity director on May 1. Previously he was managing editor of the literary website The Rumpus. Harper Christian has licensed exclusive rights to sell and distribute print editions of the entire catalog of titles from Spanish publishing house Editorial CLIE worldwide outside of Spain. The announcement underscores that the agreement includes the popular 1977 revised Reina-Valera Spanish Bible translation. CLIE books will be issued by Harper Christian as a separate imprint in their international roster, joining Grupo Nelson and Vida. As noted previously, it’s […]
Former Rodale Star Zinczenko Pairs with Random House On Imprint, Book Deal, and Distribution
Random House Publishing Group will partner with former Rodale executive David Zinczenko for an imprint, a multi-book contract, and a distribution deal. The imprint, Zinc Ink, will issue 6 to 12 lifestyle and nonfiction titles a year starting in 2014 in a profit-sharing arrangement. Titles signed include Maria Menounos’s The EveryGirl’s Diet and boxer and trainer Michael Olajide Jr.’s Sleekify. Zinczenko’s colleague at Galvanized Brands, chief operating officer Stephen Perrine, will be co-publisher alongside BBD publisher Libby McGuire. They will acquire along with BBD nonfiction editorial director, Jennifer Tung. Zinczenko will write three books to be determined on exercise, diet and […]
Pre-London Dealmaking Is Moderate As the Money Goes to Fiction
It’s time for our annual look at dealmaking activity in advance of the London Book Fair and as usual, we keep trying to find ways of looking at our deal report data that can reveal meaningful patterns rather than slight statistical oddities. It’s hard, because every weekday brings an average of 30 to 50 deal reports. So if we did this analysis tomorrow, with one more pre-LBF day of reports included the limited-window data would increase. Therefore, below we are going to show you some data from the past month as well as year-to-date deal totals. First up is year-to-date […]
Newsmaking Authors: Malala Yousafzai to Tell Her Story, and Amanda Knox April Release Remains On Track
Malala Yousafzai, the 15-year-old Pakistani girl who was shot in the head by the Taliban after her public advocacy for education for girls, is telling her story in a book that multiple Hachette imprints will publish, starting this fall, we can report exclusively. I AM MALALA will tell in her own words what happened the day she was shot, and share the inspiring story of her determination not be intimidated by extremists and recount the support of her family, which bolstered her remarkable courage. (A co-author will be named later, though Yousafzai first attracted international attention for her once-anonymous blog, […]
With Geithner’s Deal, The Potential and The Challenge
As reported widely on Thursday–with a full deal report at PublishersMarketplace–the lengthy auction for former Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner’s book has concluded with Crown winning rights and aiming for a 2014 publication. How much Geithner reveals and how book buyers feel about his record will certainly weigh heavily on the book’s performance when released. In anticipation of the sale, analyst Peter Hildick-Smith at book audience research firm The Codex Group queried a survey panel of just over 5,000 recent book buyers on Geithner’s “Author Equity” for us. (We’ll be featuring some other custom Codex Group research here in the days to come.) […]