Publishers Lunch

Original Felt Co-Author Sues Over Value that Never Materialized Ralph de Toledano filed suit last week in Washington, DC against Mark Felt, his son and attorney John O’Connor, alleging that he would not have signed away rights for just $5,000 to the 1979 book he co-authored with Felt if they hadn’t concealed that Felt would reveal he was Deep Throat. The suit claims that the Vanity Fair article which broke the news “increased the value of the book rights to a reported $1 million,” the Washington Times says, though the marketplace has already proven that sum as vastly overstated. Washington […]

Monday, July 10 Our Usual Reminder If for some reason this has reached you even though you are not a paying member of PublishersMarketplace, please visit the link below to join us all the time for complete deal reports and more. Click to register http://www.publishersmarketplace.com/register.shtml Deal Reports Just e-mail to deals@PublishersMarketplace if you aren’t using the online form linked below. Report a deal using the online form The Key As usual, the handy key to our Lunch deal categories. While all reports are always welcome, those that include a category will generally receive a higher listing when it comes time […]

Brock Presses on Coulter Crown author David Brock’s organization Media Matters isn’t letting go of the Ann Coulter plagiarism charges, and this morning the group released a letter to Random House executives. It states in part: “Coulter has exhibited a pattern of behavior suggesting that Godless itself may include other examples of plagiarism beyond those Barrie has already identified. Now that the newspaper syndicate that publishes Coulter’s column has indicated it will investigate the charges, we urge Random House to undertake a comprehensive review and consider all appropriate action, up to and including pulling the book.” Media Matters August Book […]

Waterstone’s Keeps Falling Waterstone’s continues to take a pounding, with same-store sales for the past nine weeks down 6.1 percent. This time they blame the distractions of the World Cup, along with the uncomfortable fact that other large companies are selling the same products at discount. As part of the announcement, parent HMV said they will close three Ottakar’s offices and lay off over 100 people, consolidating operations into the Waterstone’s head office. They expect to change all of the Ottakar’s 142 locations to Waterstone’s outlets before the end of the year, and have told investors they expect the acquisition […]

Tuesday, July 4 Our Usual Reminder If for some reason this has reached you even though you are not a paying member of PublishersMarketplace, please visit the link below to join us all the time for complete deal reports and more. Click to register http://www.publishersmarketplace.com/register.shtml Deal Reports Just e-mail to deals@PublishersMarketplace if you aren’t using the online form linked below. Report a deal using the online form The Key As usual, the handy key to our Lunch deal categories. While all reports are always welcome, those that include a category will generally receive a higher listing when it comes time […]

PGW Gets Rich Robert Kiyosaki and Donald Trump have picked PGW to distribute their October book, WHY WE WANT YOU TO BE RICH: Two Men — One Message. The distributor will also sell RICH WOMAN by Kim Kiyosaki, and two other fall titles from Rich Press. German Publisher Drops Google Suit Google has made progress on one legal front: German academic publisher Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft (WBG) has dropped its lawsuit, supported by the Borsenverein, seeking an injunction from a German court to stop Google from scanning books for its library program without permission from copyrightholders. They did so after a Hamburg […]