Sales at Scholastic in their second quarter nudged up 1 percent to $660 million, as operating income fell $2.4 million to $105.6 million. Earnings would have been up sharply, except the company took $40 million in mostly non-cash writedowns. There was a $36.3 million charge from their “decision to consolidate supplemental non-fiction and library publishing activities into the children’s book segment” and another $3.8 million charge “related to assets received in connection with the dissolution of a joint venture in the United Kingdom.” Trade book sales fell 4.5 percent, at $49.6 million for the quarter. Their school book clubs showed […]
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New Macmillan eBook Policy Mixes Enhanced Editions and Frontlist Delays
Macmillan ceo John Sargent reported a new ebook policy for the house yesterday, blending enhanced, premium price e-versions with a delay of “several months” on other titles: “Our goal is to give the consumer what they want, when they want it, at a fair price. In 2010 we will publish our bestsellers in several ways. Some bestsellers will be enhanced with additional content and priced to reflect their increased value to the consumer. These will be published at the same time as the hardcover and will be available for three months as special editions. We will publish other bestsellers, without […]
Edelweiss Pairs with NetGalley
In other digital announcements, the Edelweiss digital catalogs will now give publishers the option of providing selected retailers, reviewers and others access to electronic galleys from NetGalley. The first electronic galleys will be available through the program in the second quarter of 2010.
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Our apologies; yesterday’s notice about was accidentally confusing in that we truncated the name of the recently-deceased John Anthony Aldren Turner, 63. As noted, Turner was publisher/packager/sales director at illustrated books company Cynthia Parzych Publishing in New York, which he ran with his wife. In other sad news to share: Patricia Kienzle Ross, 66, died on December 5, from a rare neurological disorder. She used voice recognition software to dictate an as-yet-unpublished autobiographical novel, Sleight of Hand. An influential children’s book editor and author of many titles, Ross was a senior editor at Knopf-Pantheon Children’s when she left publishing in […]
Bookselling: Indies Discuss Kiosk Platform; West Village Store Has New Lease
A number of independent booksellers organized a Twitter discussion about what a shared in-store kiosk platform might look like. Among the ideas/wish list: letting customers access a database of bookseller reviews (the top wish from Skylight Books and Rainy Day); view digital content (samples; book trailers); and browse inventory. The manager of Breathe Books Jenn Northington posted a brief summary, and you can view the posts and participants under the Twitter tag #indiekiosk The NYT reports that Left Bank Books in the West Village, which expected to close when its lease was not renewed, has found a new larger space […]
The New eRights Battle
As many readers know by now, last Friday Random House ceo Markus Dohle wrote to agents with the twofold purpose of summarizing some of the publisher’s ebook and electronic marketing initiatives, and reasserting their view that “the vast majority of [their] backlist contracts grant us the exclusive right to publish books in electronic format.” Since many agents disagree with that view, the letter was quickly interpreted as a warning shot to Jane Friedman’s start-up Open Road and any others who would aspire to electronic rights to legacy titles still active in the marketplace. And some saw the possibility that Random […]