Anna Paustenbach has been promoted to editor at Harper One. At Metropolitan, Grigory Tovbis has been promoted to senior editor. Brian Lax becomes assistant editor. At Trident Media Group, Alice Fugate and Logan Harper have both been promoted to associate agent. Kurestin Armada has joined Root Literary. She was previously at P.S. Literary Agency. Megan Barnard has joined the Jennifer De Chiara Literary Agency as associate agent. In the UK, Rose Tomaszewska will stay on at Virago, where she has been working parental leave cover for the past seven months. And Alex Hardy has returned to Hachette UK, in the […]
Free
People, Etc.
Quarto has hired Polly Powell, owner of what now operates as Pavilion Books, as chief executive officer of the company’s UK operations, and executive director of the company. Powell had been working as an advisor to lead owner CK Lau since this past October. Andrea Giunti Lombardo, whose family bought 6.2 million shares in Quarto in its recent capital raise, has also joined the board, as non-executive director of the company. He replaces Michael Mousley. Powell said, “I am excited to be joining the Board of Quarto. I have enormous respect for CK, and I think that having Italian publisher and […]
Briefs
People Linda Kaplan of Defiore and Company will now handle foreign rights for Mansion Street Literary Management. Awards Canadian author Susan Swan and Harper Canada senior editor Janice Zawerbny have founded the Carol Shields Prize for Fiction, which will award $150,000 annually to a work of fiction by a woman or nonbinary person published in the previous year, beginning in 2022. The prize is funded for the first three years by an anonymous corporate donor, and Swan and Zawerbny have created a foundation to raise money for administrative costs. Additionally, four finalists will each receive $12,500. The NYT writes that […]
Harper Reports Weak Holiday Quarter
News Corp. reported earnings for their fiscal second quarter, ending December 31, with Harper Collins registering its third consecutive weak quarter. Sales of $442 million were down $52 million from a year ago, falling 11 percent. EBITDA fell further, down 28 percent, to $63 million from $88 million. The company attributed the shortfalls “primarily due to the difficult comparisons to the prior year” — but it was a soft holiday compared to earlier periods, too. In 2017 sales were $469 million and EBITDA was $78 million. Digital sales increased 5 percent compared to the prior year, primarily due to a […]
Corporate: Barnes & Noble “A Big Mess”; A Big Charge At Luebbe; Booktopia Adds Funding
Barnes & Noble ceo James Daunt, speaking to inews.co.uk following the release of Waterstones’ results, declares of BN, “We had a pretty awful Christmas over here.” He adds, “But that was because there are parts that I’ve abandoned.” More broadly, he says BN is “as Waterstones was in 2011, which is: not very good bookshops, not looking very nice. It’s a big mess.” While publishers like Lagardere are investing in games, Germany’s Luebbe is taking a big charge after a misadventure there. The company said it will take an impairment loss of between 12 and 14 million euros against its […]
People, Etc.
Hannah Braaten has joined Gallery Books as a senior editor. She was previously at St. Martin’s. Nick Amphlett has been promoted to editor at William Morrow. Kate Roddy has joined Sourcebooks as assistant editor. At Penguin Random House, Randi Rosenkranz has been promoted to senior vice president, sales development. Jessica Wells has been promoted to senior director, customer operations.