Following the discussion at Winter Institute that we covered in Thursday’s lunch, Hachette Book Group ceo David Young formally confirmed their adoption of any agency model in a letter sent to agents. As part of that move, they will indeed drop their strategy of windowed releases and release e-books simultaneously with hardcovers Young writes: “There are many advantages to the agency model, for our authors, retailers, consumers, and publishers. It allows Hachette to make pricing decisions that are rational and reflect the value of our authors’ works. In the long run this will enable Hachette to continue to invest in […]
A New Message to Macmillan Authors and Illustrators
This message ran as a paid advertisement in the February 4 edition of Publishers Lunch.To: Macmillan Authors and Illustratorscc: Literary AgentsFrom: John Sargent I am sorry I have been silent since Saturday. We have been in constant discussions with Amazon since then. Things have moved far enough that hopefully this is the last time I will be writing to you on this subject. Over the last few years we have been deeply concerned about the pricing of electronic books. That pricing, combined with the traditional business model we were using, was creating a market that we believe was fundamentally unbalanced. […]
Macmillan Speaks–In NYT Ad
In a full-page ad in the art section of today’s New York Times, Henry Holt’s Metropolitan imprint celebrates the sales success of Atul Gawande’s THE CHECKLIST MANIFESTO. A bold tagline offers an of-the-moment twist on the standard declaration: “Available at booksellers everywhere except Amazon.”
People and More
House of Anansi Press publisher since 2005 Lynn Henry is moving to Doubleday Canada as publishing director, starting March 1. She will acquire her own list, and senior editors Amy Black, Nina Pronovost and Tim Rostron will report to her. At Random House, under editorial director Jennifer Hershey, Jessica Waters, Courtney Moran, Courtney Turco and Clare Swanson to have all been promoted and are now assistant editors. Kathleen Tucker will retire as editor-in-chief at Albert Whitman & Company on April 30. A search for a replacement is underway. UK consumer research organization Book Marketing (BML) has been bought by Bowker, […]
Publishing Execs Talk to Booksellers About the Agency Model and More
It’s a safe bet that when David Young of Hachette, Madeline McIntosh of Random House and Drake McFeely of Norton first agreed to discuss the impact of digitization at the ABA’s Winter Institute in San Jose they had no idea of the hot-button issues the timing would bring. For the most part the questions skirted the issues rather than plunging in, but it was the first chance to hear publicly from Random House, which so far has spoken more by not making a deal with Apple than anything else. Young made it clear that at Hachette they “had been considering […]
Sales Rebound and Harper Makes Some Money; Murdoch on Apple
In the holiday fiscal second quarter, ending December 31, HarperCollins had sales of $381 million and operating income of $65 million–a considerable improvement from sales of $305 million and a mere $23 million in operating income a year ago. Parent News Corp. says they had “higher sales at the general and the children’s book divisions which were partially offset by higher royalty and manufacturing costs.” It’s the first quarterly improvement in sales after five straight declines (so yes, the bar is lower). Operating income had already turned positive in the first quarter of this year, reported in early November. Two […]