Kaplan ceo Thomas Leppert has resigned, effective August 21, and will be replaced by Andrew Rosen, chairman of Kaplan and evp of its owner Graham Holdings Company. Lepper joined Kaplan in 2013 and “led the expansion of Kaplan’s highly successful international business and a turnaround at Kaplan Test Prep.” Chairman of the parent company Donald Graham said Leppert “has been a huge contributor to every aspect of Kaplan’s worldwide business. We are sorry to lose Tom, but understand why he wanted to leave; the pace of change at Kaplan will continue.” He adds, “No one knows Kaplan and its people better than Andy does.” Jeffrey […]
New Releases/Forthcoming
Watchman Stats and Stories
We’ll try to keep this as brief as possible. Barnes & Noble announced Wednesday that sales of Harper Lee’s Go Set a Watchman “at its bookstores nationwide have surpassed first day sales of all other adult trade fiction books in its company history, including Dan Brown’s The Lost Symbol, the previous bestselling book, which was published in 2009.” Mostly that release shows that BN still has a little PR savvy left in them, since the declaration is not all that different from Amazon’s earlier note that Watchman was their “most pre-ordered print title since the 2007 release” of Harry Potter […]
Carter Op-Ed Claims “Full Story” on WATCHMAN Manuscript Discovery
Over the weekend all pretense of holding to the Tuesday embargo for reviews of GO SET A WATCHMAN evaporated. Michiko Kakutani went first late Friday, revealing in her NYT review (which essentially doubled as breaking news) that Harper Lee’s original novel — out of which resulted TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD — presents an older, infirm Atticus Finch espousing racist, segregationist views and going to “at least one KKK meeting.” At the same time, it appeared the WSJ’s “pre-publication marketing campaign” included an essay from Lee’s “estate trustee, lawyer, and friend” Tonja B. Carter, who claims to tell the “full story, […]
Forthcoming: Knopf to Publish Strayed’s BRAVE ENOUGH In October
Knopf announced they will publish Cheryl Strayed‘s BRAVE ENOUGH, which “will draw from the wide range of Strayed’s writings and hone in on more than 100 of her most popular quotes,” on October 27, with a planned 100,000-copy first printing for the $16.95 hardcover. The author of WILD as well as TINY BEAUTIFUL THINGS said in the announcement: “From the comic to the profound, the simple to the complex, the sorrowful to the ecstatic, the inspiring to the stern, whenever I need consolation or encouragement, a clear-eyed perspective or a swift kick in the pants—which is often — quotes are what […]
New Release Radar
Release dates are getting more attention than usual, with Harper Lee and Ta-Nehisi Coates publishing next Tuesday and a new Dr. Seuss coming out at the end of July, but we have a lot more than that on our radar. The New Release pages at our Lunchapedia section quietly catalog over 100 prominent new publications a month. We recently posted the big September overview (with more than 150 titles to watch), joining the equally thorough lists for August (still packed with new fiction) and July.
People: A Harry Potter Play, and More
JK Rowling announced on Twitter that she has written a play — Harry Potter and Cursed Child — that will open in London’s West End next summer. She calls it “a collaboration” with writer Jack Thorne and director John Tiffany, along with singer-songwriter Imogen Heap. Tickets will go on sale this fall, and the production will be stated at the Palace Theatre. The theater’s website says the play “will explore the backstory leading up to Harry’s parents untimely death at the hands of Lord Voldemort.” Rowling writes, “I’ve had countless offers to extend Harry’s story over the years, but Jack, […]