Book View
FROM PUBLISHING
TRENDS (APRIL 2004)
People
Neil
Ortenberg, EVP of the Avalon Publishing Group
and Publisher of Thunders Mouth/Nation Books
has resigned. He may be reached at (917) 620-4435.
Becky
Saletan is joining Harcourt as Editor in
Chief in June. She was Editorial Director of North
Point Press. Tina Pohlmann is also joining
as Senior Editor, Harvest. She was Senior Editor
at Carroll & Graf and replaces Kati Hesford,
who has resigned to join her husband who has been posted
to the American Embassy in Rome. ... Rosemary Ahern
has joined Other Press as Executive Editor to
spearhead their fiction program. She was most recently
at Washington Square Press.
Chuck
Adams is joining Algonquin Books “overseeing
the editorial effort,” and based in Chapel Hill, though
he will spend time each month in New York. He was at
S&S. ... Michael Kazan, EVP, Director
of Business Development and Client Relations at Spier
Inc., has left the company and may be reached at mkazan4207@aol.com.
… Jeannie Bailey is moving to Nashville to work
for Thomas Nelson as Director National Accounts.
She will report to Ron Land. Most recently she
was Director of Mass Market Sales for DK. ...
Kathleen Halligan, formerly manager, National
Accounts Random House Children’s Books, has joined
Ripe Ideas, a brand development company. She
may be reached at (212) 905-3173 or kathleen@
ripeideasinc.com. … Ben Bruton, Assoc. Director
of Publicity at Doubleday, is taking his title
and going to Atria/S&S.
Sara
Nelson, Glamour’s Senior Contributing Editor,
Books, and columnist for The New York Observer,
will do a regular Monday morning stint on Air America,
the new liberal radio network.
Atlanta-based
The News Group has opened new offices in New
Jersey to service the book publishing community. Sharon
Hails has left Harlequin after eight months,
to become VP Book Sales and Marketing. Marcia Roney
is Director of Book Marketing. They may be reached at
shailstng@aol.com
and
mroneytng@ aol.com
or
(973) 237-9600.
PGW
has hired two Marketing Managers — Eric Kettunen,
former US General Manager for Lonely Planet,
who replaced the departed Michele Crim, and Rick
Bauer, former Senior VP of Viz, the US publisher
of Japanese animation comics.
In agency
news, Elizabeth Sheinkman is opening a London
branch of the Elaine Markson Agency. Jennifer
Repo joined the Joelle Delbourgo agency based
in Los Angeles. She was at Riverhead and Perigee. Anita
Diggs has joined Frank Weimann’s The Literary
Group as an agent. She recently left now-defunct
Savoy magazine.
Elsewhere,
Gordon Macomber has been named President of the
Thomson Gale Publishing Group. Macomber was most
recently CEO of Merriam Webster. … Keith Titan
has joined RH as VP, Director of New Media. He was Senior
Director of e-publishing & e-commerce at S&S. ... Michael
Morrison has hired Rob McMahon as Senior
Editor of Morrow/Avon. He was most recently at
Putnam. ... Beau Friedlander has gone
to Reed Elsevier’s Reed Press as Executive Editor,
working for Fred Ciporen. He had been Publisher
and Editor in Chief of Context Books, and replaces
Nick Weir Williams, who left recently.
Houghton
Children’s Books’ Editorial Director Judy O’Malley
has left the company after just over a year.
Promotions
Perseus
announced that Stephen Bottum, formerly Executive
Managing Editor and Publishing Manager for Basic
Books, Basic Civitas, and Counterpoint,
has been promoted to VP, Group Managing Editor. William
Morrison Garland has been promoted from Associate
Managing Editor to the position of M.E. of Basic Books,
Basic Civitas, and Counterpoint. Megan Hustad
has been promoted to Editor for Basic Books, Basic Civitas
and Counterpoint. ... James Howitt has been promoted
to Director of Client and Product Development at Bookscan.
He moved from the UK to the US office last April.
April
Events
The
Academy of American Poets, whose Ninth Annual National
Poetry Month takes place in April, kicks off with its
second annual benefit, Poetry & the Creative Mind on
April 6, at Lincoln Center. Senator Edward M. Kennedy,
Tony Kushner, Kevin Kline, Wynton Marsalis,
Louis Menand, Vanessa Redgrave, and Meryl
Streep, among others, will read their favorite poems.
• The
final lecture in the five-part series on the Algonquin
Round Table, “Wit’s End on West 44th Street” will feature
biographer Marion Meade speaking about the life
of Dorothy Parker. April 13th at 6 p.m. at the
Small Press Center, 20 West 44th. Call (212)
840-1840 or go to www.
generalsociety.org.
• Jupitermedia’s
Digital Rights Management Strategies Conference will
be held April 12-14 at the Crowne Plaza Times Square.
The conference focuses on DRM business and technology
issues and explores copyright, online piracy and other
current issues. Speakers include ContentGuard
CEO Michael Miron, Wiley’s Director, New
Initiatives, Jonathan Stowe, and Siva Vaidhyanathan,
Director, Communications Studies, NYU, and author
of Copyrights and Copywrongs and the just published
The Anarchist in the Library. To register email
registration@
jupitermedia.com or
call (203) 662-2857. Also at the Crowne Plaza this month:
The April 20th PAMA luncheon features a panel
discussion entitled “Break Out Books.” Denise Berthiaume
is moderator and St. Martin’s John Cunningham
and Lisa Gallagher and S&S/Atria’s
Judith Curr will participate. Contact: PAMA_NY@hotmail.com.
• NYU’s
Center for Publishing will hold its second Management
Forum for Independent Publishers on April 23-24. Speakers
include Borders’ Phil Ollila, Harvard
Business School Press’s David Goehring and
keynote David Godine. Call (212) 992-3236 for
details.
• The
LA Times Festival of Books takes place
April 24-25, and the LA Times Book Prizes will
be presented at UCLA on April 24. In addition to nine
category awards, the annual Robert Kirsch Award
will recognize an author whose oeuvre focuses on the
Western region of the US. For more information call
(800) LATIMES, ext. 72366.
Duly
Noted
The
Village Voice reports that Tod Sacerdoti’s
How to Use Google has been at the top of Amazon’s bestseller
lists for months. A 12-page PDF, it costs $1.99. Now
Sacerdoti is taking the concept of short and cheap to
traditional books, providing summaries of popular nonfiction
books, including Jack, Straight from the Gut,
and Atkins New Diet Revolution in PDF formats.
He contacts publishers for rights, and claims that,
“while some have said please don’t do this, some have
said, please do do this.”
• The
March 29th edition of the NYT contains
an editorial that begins “Last September the Office
of Foreign Assets Control — part of the Treasury Department
— made a surprising ruling. Publishers could publish
works by authors living in certain countries, including
Iran, Libya, Sudan and Cuba, but they couldn’t edit
them. Those countries are subject to American economic
sanctions, and the office decided that to consult with
an author about a manuscript was against the rules.”
The editorial ends with the rousing line, “Ideas pose
no risk to us until we begin to try to control them.”
Separately, AAP and member publishers have met
with Bush Administration officials to protest this ruling.
The AAP board is meeting in April to discuss options,
which are said to include the possibility of a lawsuit.
Separately, PEN American Center sent a letter
to the Treasury Department — and cc’d President Bush,
among others — requesting “an immediate review of OFAC
regulations that could be interpreted to bar or restrict
in any way publication of literature.” The letter strongly
suggested a First Amendment infringement. Several book
and magazine publishers have already vowed to flout
the ruling, and the Council on Literary Magazines and
Presses (CLMP) stated it will support their efforts.
• Services
for Spalding Gray have been planned: The first
service will be April 15 at the Vivian Beaumont Theatre
at Lincoln Center in New York City, at a time yet to
be determined. The second service is scheduled for 5
p.m. on May 15 at the Whaling Church in Sag Harbor,
N.Y.
©2004
Publishing Trends
