Terry Pratchett, 66, author of more than 70 books including the Discworld series, died Thursday morning from complications of Alzheimer’s disease, which he was diagnosed with in 2007. Transworld managing director Larry Finlay said in a statement: “I was deeply saddened to learn that Sir Terry Pratchett has died. The world has lost one of its brightest, sharpest minds. In over 70 books, Terry enriched the planet like few before him. As all who read him know, Discworld was his vehicle to satirize this world: he did so brilliantly, with great skill, enormous humour and constant invention. Terry faced his […]
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Curtis Brown UK has acquired the entirety of Conville & Walsh a full year before the agreed deadline of final acquisition (after purchasing a 50 percent share in the agency two years ago). Conville & Walsh will retain its name and identity and continue to operate within Curtis Brown’s Haymarket offices, but its back office functions will be integrated into Curtis Brown. Jonny Geller, joint CEO of Curtis Brown, said in the announcement: “From the first day of working with Clare and Patrick and their fantastic team of agents and assistants, we knew it was going to work. Their flair, sense […]
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Houghton Mifflin Harcourt has hired Leigh Zarelli as svp of consumer brands, driving the strategic direction and expansion of direct-to-consumer product offerings. They have also hired Caroline Fraser as vp of program development and acquisition, spearheading new content development for the consumer market and identifying new media channels for HMH’s stable of iconic brands and characters. Zarelli was at AOL; Fraser was at Scholastic Media — and both will report to evp and chief of consumer brands and strategy, CJ Kettler. In the Random House publicity department, Jennifer Garza has been promoted to assistant director; Michelle Jasmine moves up to publicity manager; and Jenna Friedman has been […]
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Random House’s ambassador to independent booksellers Ruth Liebmann “will expand her role to provide the same critical support to the Penguin Publishing Group with our independent booksellers as she does currently for the Random House divisions.” She takes on the broader title of vp, account marketing, Penguin Random House (and she maintains her oversight of the Random House Events Department). President of sales Jaci Updike writes, “Every day, Ruth makes an exceptional difference with our independent booksellers. A former New York City bookseller, Ruth began her career at Random House in 1995 as a Manhattan sales rep. Over the past two decades, […]
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Agent Sara Megibow, who recently left the Nelson Literary Agency, is joining KT Literary. At Farrar, Straus, Brian Gittis and Steve Weil have both been promoted to assistant director of publicity. In addition, Sarah Scire has been promoted to publicist, and Lis McAvoy moves up to assistant publicist. At Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, Stephanie Kim has been promoted to publicity manager. Rick Pascocello will leave his position as vp, executive marketing director at Penguin Random House at the end of the month after 23 years in publishing, mostly at Penguin. He can be reached at rpascocello@gmail.com. Imprint News: Carole Tonkinson‘s new inspirational lifestyle imprint at […]
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The second book on Mark Zuckerberg’s 2015 reading list is Steven Pinker‘s The Better Angels of Our Nature (Viking/Penguin). “It’s a timely book about how and why violence has steadily decreased throughout our history, and how we can continue this trend,” Zuckerberg writes. At 832 pages, Zuckerberg and Facebook friends will take four weeks to read the book instead of two — but he will “add a third book in two weeks that will be a shorter read to complement this.” At Wiley, Mark Allin is being promoted to executive vice president, chief operating officer, effective May 1, with strategic and operational responsibility for Wiley’s […]