Confirmed via Twitter though not officially announced yet by the ABA, Anthony Marra‘s debut novel A CONSTELLATION OF VITAL PHENOMENA from Hogarth will be the No. 1 Indie Next pick for May. Marra was among the authors appearing at Winter Institute 8 and you can read a 20-page excerpt from the beginning of his book right now in the current edition of our packed free ebook BUZZ BOOKS 2013: Spring/Summer. It also includes a sample from No. 1 Indie Next April book Kate Atkinson’s LIFE AFTER LIFE, another April pick (Aleksandr Hemon’s The Book of My Lives), and more highly-touted […]
New Imprints
Imprints: Little Brown UK Tries Literary Digital Line; Atria Reannounces Rachael Ray Books
Little Brown UK is expanding their digital imprints (which include Crime Vault and Piatkus Entice) with a line focused on literary fiction, Blackfriars. It launches in July and aims to publish nine to 12 titles a year, under the direction of Abacus publishing director Clare Smith and Virago associated publisher Ursula Doyle. One of their first titles is Benjamin Anastas’s memoir TOO GOOD TO BE TRUE, which received some good reviews in the US, but suffered under the limitations of Amazon Publishing. (Ironically, in the UK Amazon still has overwhelming market share for ebooks, so they will still be the primary outlet […]
People, Etc.
Mary Ann Naples is returning to book publishing as publisher of Rodale Books, starting March 4, following detours to OpenSky and then, briefly, Zola Books (as head of business development; she will now join Zola’s strategic advisory board.) Naples had been a co-founder of literary agency The Creative Culture after working at Hyperion. Jim Hanas will join HarperCollins as director of audience development, reporting to cmo Angela Tribelli. Previously he was social media editor at the New York Observer. In the UK, Harper is once again reshuffling and rebranding imprints, consolidating their nonfiction lines. Harper Press and parts of Collins are […]
People, Etc.: Former ICM Head Jeff Berg’s New Agency, Resolution
Former chairman of ICM Jeff Berg, who left the company last fall after a protracted battle with other executives, will launch a new agency, Resolution, this week. Deadline reports the new agency has set up a Los Angeles office and will grow “to an anticipated staffing level of 35 agents plus support staff in LA, 25 agents in NYC, and 10 agents in Nashville” over the next six months. Among those set to join Resolution are book-to-film agents Rich Green, moving over after 9 years with CAA, and Shari Smiley, who operated her own outfit for the past year after […]
Book News: A Lahiri Novel, Algonquin’s Teen Line, Adaptations and ALA Award Candidates
Pulitzer Prize winner for INTERPRETER OF MALADIES Jhumpa Lahiri‘s THE LOWLAND–her second novel after THE NAMESAKE–will be published on September 24 by Knopf (and by Bloomsbury UK). It’s the second book in their deal from 2006, reportedly for $4 million. The Fox Network has ordered a pilot for an adaptation of Lauren Oliver‘s DELIRIUM. Bookseller Mitchell Kaplan’s Mazur/Kaplan Company is executive producing with Chernin Entertainment and 20th Century Fox Television, with the pilot written by executive producer Karyn Usher wrote the pilot which Fox just approved. In the day’s most unusual adaptation news, Hilary Mantel’s Booker-winning duo WOLF HALL and BRING […]
Amazon Gives Their Children’s Imprints Names
Amazon has given their children’s book publishing more distinctive imprint names to work with than just “Amazon Children’s.” Picture books are being published under the Two Lions banner and teen books are listed under the Skyscape name. The imprint names and logos are introduced in the Amazon Children’s Publishing catalog from their Brilliance Publishing unit, which distributes those titles. Amazon’s children’s publishing program incorporates the more than 450 titles they acquired in late 2011 from Marshall Cavendish as well as the titles they have been acquiring directly. (As with other Amazon imprints, some of those acquisitions include books that were […]