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 to put them all together. “nice deal” $1 – $49,000 “very nice deal” $50,000 – $99,000 “good deal” $100,000 – $250,000 “significant deal” $251,000 – $499,000 “major deal” $500,000 and up FICTION Debut Author non-fiction books including A THOUSAND DAYS IN VENICE, A THOUSAND […]
Lunch for Friday, February 1
ICM UK’s Kate Jones Dies, Just as Deal with Curtis Brown UK Was Getting Closer The head of the ICM Books office in London and former Viking UK and Hamish Hamilton editor Kate Jones died this morning. The funeral will be private, though some kind of memorial event is expected to follow. That news comes just on the heels of fresh reports in the UK on the longstanding business discussions between ICM and Curtis Brown UK. A source involved in the negotiations told us that ICM’s focus for now is attending to Kate Jones’s family and taking care of her […]
Lunch for Thursday, January 31
Amazon Offers to Acquire Audible This morning Amazon announced it is offering to acquire Audible, valuing the company at approximately $300 million. Amazon is offering $11.5 a share, a 23 percent premium over yesterday’s closing price (though substantially lower than the company’s 2007 high point of $14 a share). The transaction is expected to close by the second quarter of 2008. Ever since it was indicated in 2005 that Amazon was interested in selling digital audiobooks directly instead of through its partnership with Audible — bolstered by the launch of Amazon’s MP3 music service last year and its acquisition of […]
Lunch for Wednesday, January 30
Oprah Picks Tolle Oprah Winfrey has gone back to inspirational nonfiction but stayed with men, selecting Eckhart Tolle’s A NEW EARTH: Awakening to Your Life’s Purpose as her latest Book Club selection. 13 Arrested in Plot Against Pamuk The Guardian reports: “Thirteen people have been arrested in Turkey as part of an investigation into an ultra-nationalist gang reported to be planning the assassination of Nobel laureate Orhan Pamuk. According to reports in the Turkish press, the author of international bestsellers including My Name is Red was targeted as part of a campaign to sow chaos in preparation for a military […]
Lunch for Tuesday, January 29
Recorded Books for Sale — Along with All of Haights Cross Following a “comprehensive strategic review,” Haights Cross Communications has decided to sell off all of its assets — including Recorded Books, which publishes unabridged audiobooks for libraries, schools, and consumers. For the first three quarters of the fiscal year, as of the end of September 2007, that unit had sales of $64.3 million. Release Editis, France’s No. 2 Publisher, Also for Sale Newspaper La Tribune reported (without citing sources) that French investment company Wendell intends to sell publishing conglomerate Editis by the middle of this year. The country’s second […]
Lunch for Monday, January 28
That Didn’t Take Long: News Corp. Settles Who knows why they didn’t pay her earlier, but News Corp. has paid Judith Regan now — an undisclosed amount, of course — and stated, “After carefully considering the matter, we accept Ms. Regan’s position that she did not say anything that was anti-Semitic in nature, and further believe that Ms. Regan is not anti-Semitic.” They call the settlement “an equitable, confidential settlement, with no admission of liability by any party.” But does it get charged to HarperCollins’ bottom line, or is it a corporate expense? The next quarterly report, due in early […]