People Round-Up, Early November 2017

PEOPLE

At Open Road, Jon Fine has joined as SVP, Publisher, replacing Tina Pohlman. He previously served in an advisory capacity to publishers and start-ups, including working as General Counsel for OptiQly.

Maureen O’Connell is departing from her position as Chief Financial Officer and Chief Administrative Officer at Scholastic.

At Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, Jim O’Neill has joined as EVP, General Manager of Core Curriculum. Previously he was Chief Product Officer at Achieve3000 and before that worked for HMH. Matthew Mugo Fields has joined as EVP, General Manager of Supplemental Curriculum, having worked previously as VP, Consumer at McGraw-Hill Education. Alejandro Reyes, previously VP, Organization and Talent Development at Laureate Education, is now SVP, Chief People Officer. Trish Torizzo joins as SVP, Chief Information Officer; she was most recently Divisional Chief Information Officer, Enterprise & Analytics at Charles River Laboratories.

Michael Pickrum will join Cengage as EVP, Chief Financial Officer on November 20. He was most recently Chief Strategy Officer at EVERFI.

Steve Fischer will retire as Executive Director of the New England Independent Booksellers Association when a successor is found. He has held his role since 2006.

Tracy Behar, longtime Executive Editor at Little, Brown, will become VP, Publisher and Editor-in-Chief for a new health, lifestyle, psychology, and science imprint for that division, to debut in Fall 2018. Former Weinstein Books staffers Amanda Murray and Georgina Levitt have been given titles at Hachette Books: Murray becomes Executive Editor and Levitt becomes Director of Brand Development. At Little, Brown, Jennifer Shaffer joins as Assistant Publicist on November 6.

J.P. Leventhal, founder of Black Dog & Leventhal, will leave his position as Publisher on December 31 after twenty-five years. Effective immediately, BD&L will become part of Running Press, reporting to Kristin Kiser.

Lee Boudreaux will leave her eponymous imprint on November 13 to join Doubleday as VP, Executive Editor. Titles signed to Lee Boudreaux Books that have not been published will be assigned to new editors and issued by Little, Brown.

At The Dial Press, Whitney Frick will take over as Executive Director on December 4. She has been Executive Editor at Flatiron Books. Noah Eaker will join Flatiron Books as Editorial Director on November 13; he has been working as Executive Editor at Random House.

Becca Putman has joined the Crown Publishing Group as Marketing Manager, Crown, Hogarth, Tim Duggan Books, and Broadway. She was formerly Sales & Marketing Associate, Academic Marketing Manager at Grove Atlantic.

On November 6, Joel Fotinos will join St. Martin’s Press as VP, Editorial Director of a new mind/body/spirit imprint, leaving his position as VP, Publisher of Tarcher Perigee. Megan Newman, presently Publisher of Avery, will become Publisher for both Avery and Tarcher Perigee, though the two will remain editorially independent. At Tor, Eileen Lawrence has joined as Executive Director of Marketing, having worked previously as Associate Publisher for Algonquin Children’s.

Additionally, Daniel Nayeri, Nathalie Le Du, and Colleen AF Venable have left their positions at Workman Children’s (as, respectively, Publisher, Executive Editor, and Art Director) to start a new imprint at Macmillan Children’s. They will serve as, again respectively, Publisher, Editorial Director, and Creative Director.

At Baker & Taylor Publisher Services, Jeff Tegge has joined as VP, Client Services. He was previously President of Legato Publishers Group.

Ilona Chavasse has left her role at Oneworld as Rights Director and has joined Unbound as its first-ever Head of Rights.

Rebecca Kuss has joined Maria B. Campbell Associates as Co-Director, Children’s Scouting. She previously worked freelance for Scholastic.

At agencies…Naoise McGee has joined AGI Vigliano as Foreign Rights Consultant, having worked previously as Subsidiary Rights Associate at Farrar, Straus & Giroux. Cassie Hanjian is joining DeFiore and Company as Agent, moving over from the same position at Waxman Leavell Literary Agency. Rachel Horowitz has joined The Bent Agency as Literary Agent; she was most recently Children’s Literary Scout at Maria B. Campbell Associates. At A.M. Heath, Alexandra McNicoll, lately Head of Translation Rights at C+W, replaces Jennifer Custer as Director of Foreign Rights.

Frank Parisi has joined Chronicle Books as Senior Editor, Entertainment. He was previously Senior Editor for Lucasfilm.

Jeff Shake has joined Rodale Books as Senior Designer. Most recently, he was Senior Designer at HarperCollins. Aly Mostel is leaving her position as Senior Communications Director and will be working freelance.

John Sloan will retire as Senior Executive Editor at Zondervan on December 15.

At Pen & Sword Books, Chris Evans has joined as Senior Editor. He most recently worked as Senior Editor at Skyhorse.

Arianna Rebolini has been named Books Editor at BuzzFeed.

PROMOTIONS

At Scholastic, Kenneth Cleary has been promoted to Chief Financial Officer. Paul Hukkanen moves up to Cleary’s previous role as Chief Accounting Officer and Vincent Lucinese has been promoted to VP, Controller and Shared Services Support.

At Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, Rose Else-Mitchell has been promoted to EVP, Chief Learning Officer, Amy Dunkin to SVP, Chief Marketing Officer, and Vicki Boyd to EVP, General Manager, Heinemann.

Erin Crum has been promoted to SVP, Corporate Communications at HarperCollins. At Harlequin, Kathleen Scheibling has been promoted to Executive Editor. At William Morrow, Kara Zauberman is now Associate Editor and Jessica Williams is now Senior Editor.

Kara Cesare has been promoted to VP, Editorial Director for Ballantine Bantam Dell. At Putnam, Katie McKee has been promoted to Executive Publicity Manager. At Doubleday, Kristine Puopolo has been promoted to Executive Editor and Margo Shickmanter has been promoted to Associate Editor.

Sarah Kelleher has been promoted to Co-Director, Children’s Scouting at Maria B. Campbell Associates.

At Macmillan Children’s, Melissa Zar has been promoted to Senior Marketing Manager and Johanna Kirby to Marketing Manager. Additionally, Mary Van Akin is now Associate Director of Publicity; Morgan Dubin, Publicity Manager; and Brittany Pearlman, Publicist. At Flatiron Books, James Melia has been promoted to Editor, while Sarah Dotts Barley has been promoted to Executive Editor, Editorial Director, Young Adult and Caroline Bleeke moves up to Editor.

Alex Levenberg has been promoted to Senior Global Rights Manager at Amazon Publishing. Adrienne Procaccini has been promoted to Senior Editor at 47 North and Skyscape.

At Gallery Books, Meagan Harris has been promoted to Assistant Director of Publicity and Theresa Dooley has been promoted to Publicist. Emma Ledbetter has been promoted to Senior Editor at Atheneum, while Navah Wolfe moves up to Senior Editor at Saga Press. At Simon & Schuster Children’s, Liz Kossnar has been promoted to Editor, Alexa Pastor to Associate Editor, and Alex Borbolla to Assistant Editor. In addition, Jen Ung has been promoted to Editor for Aladdin, while Sylvie Frank has been promoted to Senior Editor at Paula Wiseman and Cindy Kim moves up to Assistant Editor for Little Simon.

In agency news, Sarah Bedingfield is now Agent at Levine Greenberg Rostan Literary Agency and Saba Sulaiman has been promoted to Associate Agent at Talcott Notch Literary Services.

Sarah Armstrong has been promoted to Client Relations Manager at Ingram Publisher Services.

At Agate Publishing, Jessica Easto has been promoted to Managing Editor and will acquire for Surrey Books and Midway Books.

At Little, Brown, Alyssa Persons has been promoted to Associate Publicist and Carina Guiterman has been promoted to Editor.

Aurora Bell has been promoted to Associate Editor for The Countryman Press.

DULY NOTED

The Pennsylvania State University has acquired Near East and biblical studies publisher Eisenbrauns as a new imprint. Founder Jim Eisenbraun will stay on as a consultant.

Red Wheel/Weiser has acquired Career Press.

As an expansion of its sales and distribution agreement with Printers Row Publishing Group, Simon & Schuster will add sales and distribution to the book trade in the US and Canada for Printers Row imprints Silver Dolphin Books, Thunder Bay Press, Canterbury Classics, and Portable Press. These changes will be effective on January 1 in Canada and May 1 in the US.

Beginning January 1, 2018, Consortium will distribute Black, Inc., Fitzcarraldo Editions, Oberon Books, and School of Life.

Beginning with their Spring 2018 list, Cameron + Company will move North American sales and trade distribution for Cameron Books and Cameron Kids from PGW to Abrams. Their general nonfiction line, Roundtree Press, will continue to be distributed by PGW.

Jennifer Johnson-Blalock has left Liza Dawson Associates to launch Hyphen, a freelance editorial and coaching company.

Children’s book editor and former literary agent Alli Brydon has launched Alli Brydon Creative, which provides kid lit coaching, editing, and writing services to authors and publishers.