PEOPLE
March brought some big announcements from industry veterans:
Teri Kelly, President of the trade and reference division at Houghton Mifflin has announced that she will leave the company where she has worked for twenty five years, once a replacement is found. And after seventeen years with the Walker Group (most recently as COO of Candlewick) Mike McGrath, is leaving to join Quercus Publishing in London, founded two years ago by Anthony Cheetham and Mark Smith. He will again be COO. Meanwhile, David Ford and Brett Brubaker, having returned to London, have launched Brubaker & Ford Ltd. (www.brubakerford.com), a book packaging and publishing consulting agency. There will be a New York office as well.
Chronicle Books has hired Bill Boedeker as Children’s Publishing Director, a new position which follows Victoria Rock’s move to the role of Editor-at-Large and Founding Publisher. Boedeker was most recently VP of Marketing and Associate Publisher for Little, Brown Books for Young Readers.
Alice van Straalen has left Vintage Books, where she was an editor, for the non-profit world. She may be reached at avanst@yahoo.com.
At Reader’s Digest, Stacey Ashton has been hired as VP, Director of Sales and Marketing, charged with growing the retail and specialty markets. She was VP, Sales and Marketing at MQ Publications.
Marion Maneker, VP Publisher of Collins Business has left HC and may be reached at maneker@optonline.net. Meanwhile, Lisa Sharkey has taken the newly created position of SVP/Director of Creative Development, HarperCollins. Sharkey will be responsible for acquiring “current event and personality driven books” for the General Books Group and “will work with all publishers to position authors for maximum television exposure.” Most recently, she was President of Al Roker Entertainment. Earlier HC hired Margot Schupf as Group SVP and Associate Publisher for Collins reporting to Joe Tessitore, Schupf most recently was Editorial Director of lifestyle books and media at Rodale.
John Tintera has also left Rodale where he was Director of Sales, for Osprey where he holds the same title. Earlier this month Zachary Schisgal, formerly Executive Editor at Rodale, moved to Touchstone Fireside as Senior Editor. Michelle Howry has also joined Touchstone Fireside as a Senior Editor. She had been at Little, Brown/ Springboard. . . .Jessica Napp has left Touchstone for Rizzoli New York as Publicity Manager.
At NBN, Linda Sinisi has joined the company as Special Sales Manager. Most recently she was Director of Special Markets at Abrams, after working on Book Sense at the ABA.
David Schanke formerly Market Segment VP General Publishing at Banta has left the company in the wake of its acquisition by RR Donnelley. He may be reached at d.schanke@yahoo.com.
St. Martin’s has hired a new Editor, Jason Pinter, from Crown. And Courtney Snyder has joined the Crown Sub Rights Department as Senior Manager, Domestic Rights, reporting to Linda Kaplan. She had been at Scholastic where she was Manager of cross-channel sales and subsidiary rights.
David George has joined Bloomberg Press as Managing Editor and Art Director, reporting to Editorial Director Jared Kieling. He was formerly a Senior
Managing Editor at Prentice Hall, Pearson Education.
Jake Elwell has joined Harold Ober as an agent. Elwell acquired Wieser & Wieser three years ago and operated it as Wieser & Elwell. Yvette Romero is now Public Relations Director at Kaplan Publishing. Most recently she had been at Monteiro & Company.
Shanta Small has gone to Tarcher/ Penguin as Associate Publicity Director and Marketing Manager.. Small was at Random House Children’s.
Susan Bradanini Betz has been hired by the Chicago Review Press as Senior Editor for Lawrence Hill Books. Cynthia Sherry was promoted to Publisher of CRP.
PROMOTIONS
Erstwhile of Regan Books, Cal Morgan has moved to the Harper imprint as VP/Executive Editor, reporting to Jonathan Burnham. In a separate announcement, Morgan’s wife Cassie Jones has joined the William Morrow imprint as Executive Editor, reporting to Lisa Gallagher. Anne Marie Spagnuolo has been promoted to Group Executive Managing Editor, Avon Books.
Steve Weitzen has been named SVP of Business Development for S&S Children’s. Assuming his former spot as head of the Simon Scribbles imprint is Valerie Garfield who is now VP, Associate Publisher.
Julia Reidhead, a longtime editor at W. W. Norton & Company and a member of the board of directors, has been named to a newly created position of Editorial Director of the College Dept. Most recently she had held the title of Director of Editing, Design, and Production.
APRIL EVENTS
PEN American Center has announced the theme “Home and Away” program for its third annual PEN World Voices: The New York Festival of International Literature, which boasts 162 writers and cultural critics from 45 countries panels, lectures, tributes, readings, one-on-one conversations, and musical performances, April 24-29. Participants include Don DeLillo, Vikram Chandra, Kiran Desai, Neil Gaiman, Nadine Gordimer, Steve Martin, and Salman Rushdie in various locations around New York For information go to www.pen.org.
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The 3rd Annual New York Round Table Writers’ Conference takes place April 13-14 at The Small Press Center. Speakers include Inkwell’s Kim Witherspoon, ICM’s Lisa Bankoff, St. Martin’s Dori Weintraub, and keynotes Colin Whitehead and Richard Ford. For more detailed information go to www.writersconferencenyc.org.
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From March 31 – April 30 Poets House celebrates its 15th Annual Showcase at its Spring Street location, with its largest display to date: 2,000 titles on view including volumes by individual authors, anthologies, biographies, critical studies, CDs and DVDs. Executive Director Lee Briccetti claims it is the “golden age of poetry production.” In 2008, Poets House will relocate to new space in a new building in Battery Park City, with “free rent guaranteed through 2069” Go to poetshouse.org for more information.
DULY NOTED
DM News reports that Amazon’s Sam Wheeler was a keynote speaker at the Direct Marketing Association’s Insert Media Day (which, alas, conflicted with the other conferences that PT did attend). He said that Amazon offers an astounding 80 million package insert opportunities annually, as well as on-box ad space and, of course, online display ads. Wheeler and other speakers argued that inserts provide income to the host, as well as sales and branding opportunities to the marketer. However, too much focus on branding can deflect the focus away from sales. “We are in the response business and we have been invaded by the brand,” one vet warned. Amazon’s program started in 2003 (see PT November, 2003).
One time HC Creative Director Joseph Montebello tells PT that he now hosts a radio show, “Between the Covers,” that airs every Tuesday on WAPJ 89.9FM and every Wednesday on WVOX 1460AM in New Rochelle. Stay tuned.
Lots of anniversaries this year: Wiley celebrates its 200th anniversary–in 1807 Charles Wiley, strayed from the family distillery business and opened a print shop in lower Manhattan. Library of America celebrates its 25th anniversary this May.
Grand Central Publishing, is the final choice for the old Warner Books…. announced Jamie Raab, SVP and Publisher. The name change comes a month before the publisher’s move to new headquarters at 237 Park Avenue, New York, New York 10017-0010.
Congrats to Jane Isay on the publication of Walking on Eggshells – and to Will Schwalbe and co-author David Shipley, on Send: The Essential Guide to Email for Home and Office. Finally, Doug Stumpf’s Confessions of a Wall Street Shoeshine Boy is coming this July (from HarperCollins).
IN MEMORIAM
Axel Rosin, former president of the Book-of-the-Month Club (and son-in-law of its founder, Harry Scherman) and later the head of the Scherman Foundation, died March 27th at his home in Manhattan. He was 99. He was president of the Book-of-the-Month Club from 1960 to 1973, and chairman until his retirement in 1979.
