After receiving a barrage of criticism back in May for sponsoring a fourth-grade lesson packet on coal-based energy that was paid for by the American Coal Foundation, Scholastic announced Sunday evening that it will cut back its InSchool marketing division’s corporate-sponsored projects and create a new review board to vet its materials. “We have to improve our standards, and make sure there’s not a scintilla of anything that could be suggested to be biased,” Scholastic president and ceo Richard Robinson told the NYT. “The vast majority of our programs are not controversial, but once in a while there was a […]
How Publishing Works
Briefs: Indigo Changes Product Mix and Plans Speedier Returns; Pan Mac Earnings; and More
Starting this fall Indigo will add more shelf space for giftware, toys and lifestyle products while cutting back on space for books. And at a vendor-relations meeting last week, the chain also reportedly informed suppliers it will evaluate book sales after 45 days and return underperforming titles soon after. The change in plans has Canadian publishers worried about supply chain inefficiencies and the potential expense of having to push back publication dates to take advantage of holiday sales. Quill & Quire Pan Macmillan offers a numbers-free earnings update for the first 24 weeks of the fiscal year, ending July 8. […]
Briefs: Celebrities and Their Ghostwriters; Stieg Larsson’s Partner; and More
For some reason the NYT thinks it’s news that celebrities use ghostwriters, but with the Kardashian sisters set to release a novel they “wrote” after Snooki’s ghostwritten novel hit the bestseller lists earlier this year, there’s the news peg for you. It’s also interesting that Atria’s Judith Curr traces the so-called celebrity novel boom to Pamela Anderson’s 2004 book STAR, which she published. NYT Speaking of manufactured celebrities, Jersey Shore star Sammi “Sweetheart” Giancola is being sued by doctor Marc L. Paulsen for allegedly failing to revise a diet book, SIZE 2 FOR LIFE, they were working on together for […]
Publishers Line Up Instant eBooks on Bin Laden Death
President Obama’s announcement of Osama Bin Laden’s death Sunday was followed quickly by book publishers planning what they could issue digitally as quickly as possible. The WSJ reports that Random House executive editor Jon Meacham will oversee and write the introduction for “Beyond Bin Laden: America and the Future of Terror,” an essay collection featuring a half-dozen other contributors that the publisher hopes to release as an ebook next week. (One essay that seems certain to be included is Salman Rushdie’s op-ed published by The Daily Beast yesterday.) In addition, Free Press is “eager” for a digital book on the […]
A Look at Borders’ Liquidation Process as More Leases Are Rejected
Bloomberg takes a closer look at the Borders liquidation process and how it’s being handled by Hilco, who agreed to pay Borders 85.75 percent of the “cost value” of all merchandise, somewhere between $180.6 million and $204 million. But one of Hilco’s competitors in the liquidation auction, Great American Group director Scott Carpenter, bowed out because the firm “didn’t think you could achieve those values and make a profit.” Previously Borders told the bankruptcy court they expected liquidation sales to bring in about $175 million. Bloomberg In addition, federal bankruptcy court filings indicate the approval of nine Borders lease rejections in […]
Thompson Studies Publishing’s Past, and Sees “A Very Complex Metamorphosis” Ahead
With Borders’ recent bankruptcy filing there’s has been a lot of renewed interest in how they–and we–got to where we are today. Which is pretty much what John Thompson chronicles in his recently-released book MERCHANTS OF CULTURE: The Publishing Business in the Twenty-First Century. The new issue of Poets & Writers has a thorough and interesting interview with Thompson by Gabriel Cohen. The good news is that “This field, which looks to the outsider like a chaotic mess, actually has a structure and a dynamic to it.” Despite all the complaining, Thompson sees book publishing as an optimistic culture by […]