Former longtime director of rights and contracts at McClelland & Stewart Marilyn Biderman has opened an eponymous literary agency, based in Toronto, and is out with her first submission in both the US and Canada: French-Canadian Marguerite Pigeon’s debut novel OPEN PIT. Biderman says she will represent genre, commercial and literary fiction, along with narrative nonfiction and memoir and “the occasional expert as a client as well.” In deciding her next step in publishing, Biderman says, “I really looked at what was important to me and where my allegiances lie. It’s always been with the publishing process and protecting the […]
New Imprints
Penguin Takes Classics to Egypt In New Joint Venture
The WSJ reports that Penguin is about to announce a joint venture with Egypt-based publisher Dar El Shorouk to publish books from the company’s Classics line in Arabic. The line is expected to debut in “the first half of 2011,” and will incorporate some Arabic classics as well. Dar El Shorouk chairman Ibrahim El Moallem believes the ebook editions in particular “will go all over the place,” even in Arabic-speaking countries where authorities try to censor books. He also “said that presenting the Penguin library as a series of the world’s greatest books may help trump the censorship issue.” The […]
Random House to Close Operations at Tricycle Press Imprint
Random House Children’s Books is closing the Berkeley-based Tricycle Press imprint, acquired as part of Ten Speed Press, on January 31, 2011. They will continue to “sell and support” the Tricycle backlist and will decide soon what label forthcoming titles will be published under. Publisher Nicole Geiger and the four editorial staff members will leave the company as result. Tricycle marketing and publicity manager Laura Mancuso will remain as part of Random House Children’s.
Prebich Reported Out At Ailing Dorchester, and More People News, Etc.
Former employees of Dorchester report that ceo John Prebich (who also ran the company’s magazine division, Dorchester Media) left the company on Friday. Queries to Prebich and other remaining employees were not answered. Rob Crawford will join The Overlook Press as editor on November 29. He has been an assistant editor at Harper. Nicholas Brealey Publishing has hired Hillary Park as publicist. She has formerly worked as associate publicist at Putnam and Riverhead and event marketing manager for Borders. The company has also partnered with Shelton Interactive to develop a new social media platform and website, and is working with […]
Peripatetic Penzler Moves Again, Now to Grove/Atlantic
Otto Penzler, who has been publishing through Houghton Mifflin Harcourt in the US for the past six years, is relaunching the Mysterious Press imprint with his newest publishing partner, Grove/Atlantic. Penzler reacquired the imprint’s name from Hachette Book Group, having sold the original Mysterious Press to Warner Books in 1989. That move parallels Penzler’s relocation in the UK, where moved his line to Grove/Atlantic spin-off Atlantic Books, as part of the new Corvus division led by Anthony Cheetham, last November. (Cheetham has previously set up Penzler’s line at his former company Quercus, after almost setting it up at Random UK’s […]
It’s Official: Rosenthal to Start Imprint at Penguin in 2011
Former publisher of the Simon & Schuster imprint David Rosenthal will indeed join Penguin, where he will set up a new, unnamed general trade imprint. He will start there on January 10, reporting to president Susan Petersen Kennedy. Launching in fall 2011, the imprint will comprise “an eclectic mix” of hardcover fiction and nonfiction, including suspense fiction, popular biography, literary novels, humor, music, and contemporary politics. The goal is to l “ultimately publish between 24 and 36 original titles per year.” How many of those will be former Simon & Schuster authors? Kennedy says to the NYT, “he has a […]