People Round-Up, Mid-February 2018

PEOPLE

Timothy Mantel joins Barnes & Noble as Chief Merchandising Officer. He previously held that role at GNC.

At Igloo Books, Darren Witherall has been appointed Chief Operating Officer. He was previously President at Parragon and will work from the UK office. In the US office, Bonnie Hunter and Jeremy Nurnberg have both been named Joint VP. Hunter previously worked as Director of Sales at Parragon US, while Nurnberg was Director of Sales within Igloo Books.

Julia Pastore has left her position as Executive Editor at Harper One to launch Julia Pastore Editorial Services. At Harlequin, Michele Bidelspach is joining as Executive Editor for Graydon House and HQN on February 26. She was previously Senior Editor at Grand Central. Denise George has joined Thomas Nelson as VP, Marketing for the W Publishing Group. She was most recently VP, Content and Consumer Development at Creative Trust.

At the Great Lakes Independent Booksellers Association, Larry Law has been named Executive Director, effective March 1. Previously he was Director of E-Commerce & Marketing at Anderson’s Bookshops in Naperville, IL.

Joy de Menil has joined Harvard University Press as Executive Editor and Director of Belknap Publishing. Most recently, she was Executive Editor at Viking.

Nancy Sheppard has left St. Martin’s Press, where she was Marketing Director, and may be reached at NancyAnn.Sheppard@gmail.com. In addition, BJ Berti has left her role as Senior Editor and will continue on as a consulting editor for some of her authors. She can be reached at bjberti@gmail.com.

Suzanne Rafer, Executive Editor and Director of Cookbook Publishing at Workman Publishing, retired on February 2. She was with Workman for almost 44 years. Lathea Williams has joined as Publicity Manager; previously, she was Assistant Publicity Manager at Sourcebooks.

At Abrams, Hana Nakamura joins as Associate Art Director, Appleseed and Amulet, moving over from the same position at Abrams Noterie.

Gary Fortier has been hired as Chief People Officer at Cengage. He was most recently CEO of Vision Government Solutions.

The Gillian MacKenzie Agency and Wolf Literary Services have merged to form MacKenzie Wolf. Partners Gillian MacKenzie and Kirsten Wolf will lead the company, with MacKenzie heading literary management and Wolf managing the legal and financial consulting division. Allison Devereux and Rach Crawford both continue as Agent and will co-manage foreign rights. Kate Johnson continues as Agent and UK Rights Manager. Elizabeth Rudnick joins as Agent-at-Large.

Elsewhere at agencies…Leonicka Valcius has joined The Transatlantic Agency as Assistant Agent, having worked most recently as Title Analyst at Penguin Random House Canada. At Bookends Literary Agency, Naomi Davis and Amanda Jain both join as Agents; they held the same roles at Inklings Literary Agency and have moved their client lists with them.

Kris Kliemann joins IPR License as US Business Development Specialist, based in New York. She is President of Kliemann & Company Consulting.

Erika Turner has joined Houghton Mifflin Harcourt’s new children’s imprint, Versify, as Editorial Project Manager. Most recently she was Managing Editor of the Vera Institute of Justice.

Madison Killen joins Chronicle Books as Children’s Marketing Manager. She was previously Manager of Creative Content at Penguin Young Readers.

At Scholastic Trade, Danielle Yadao has joined as Marketing Manager, Educational Marketing. Most recently she was Marketing Coordinator at Little, Brown Books for Young Readers.

Eric Henney joins Basic Books as Editor. Previously he was Commissioning Editor at Princeton University Press.

Allison Cohen joins Running Press Kids as Editor, having worked previously as Literary Agent at The Gersh Agency.

At the New York Times, author Rumaan Alam joins the Books desk as Special Projects Editor.

Maya Fakundiny has joined the Book Industry Study Group as Operations Manager, replacing the outgoing Kim Graff. Graff joins Macmillan Learning as Senior Content Standards Project Manager.

PROMOTIONS

Jen Enderlin is now sole Publisher at St. Martin’s Press, with all of that unit’s publishing units reporting to her. Additionally, Andrew Martin is now SVP, Executive Publishing Director for St. Martin’s Press in addition to his existing role as Publisher of Minotaur. Anne Marie Tallberg is now VP, Publishing Director for paperbacks and Griffin, while Hannah Braaten and Vicki Lame have both been promoted to Editor; April Osborn, to Senior Associate Editor; and Laura Apperson, to Associate Editor. DJ DeSmyter and Kim Lew both move up to Associate Marketing Manager, and Titi Oluwo becomes Assistant Marketing Manager. Rebecca Lang is now Senior Publicity Manager, while Katie Bassel moves to Publicity Manager and Kathryn Hough to Senior Publicist. At SMP Paperbacks, Monique Patterson has been promoted to Editorial Director, Eileen Rothschild to Senior Editor, and Alexandra Sehulster to Associate Editor. Courtney Littler moves up to Editor at Castle Point Books, while Sarah Peed has become Editor. And at Picador, Pronoy Sarkar has been promoted to Associate Editor.

At HarperCollins Christian Publishing, John Kramp has been promoted to SVP, Group Publisher, Bibles, while Doug Lockhart moves up to SVP, Bible Marketing and New Initiatives. At Zondervan, Melinda Bouma becomes Publisher, while Daniel Marrs is now Publisher, Thomas Nelson Bibles. Angela Craft has been promoted to Marketing Director for Avon and Harper Voyager. Penny Makras has been promoted to Associate Director, Marketing for Harper Wave and Harper Business. And Mary Gaule has been promoted to Assistant Editor for Harper and Harper Perennial.

Lucy Cummins has been promoted to Executive Art Director at Simon & Schuster Children’s and Paula Wiseman Books.

At Princeton University Press, Alison Kalett has been promoted to Editorial Director for the Sciences, while Eric Crahan becomes Editorial Director for the Humanities and Sarah Caro becomes Editorial Director for the Social Sciences. In addition, Amanda Peery has been promoted to Associate Editor, History, and Jessica Yao has been promoted to Associate Editor.

Julia Romero has been promoted to Director of Sales for Klutz, while Courtney DeVerges moves up to Sales Representative. At Scholastic Trade, Keith Fretz has been promoted to Senior Product Manager, Digital; Devin MacDonald, Marketing Brand Manager; Monica Palenzuela, Publicity Manager, Brands; Steve Ponzo, Designer; Vaishali Nayak, Associate Marketing Manager; Lauren Carr, Publicity Coordinator; Jeffrey West and Olivia Valcarce, both Assistant Editor; Samantha Swank, Associate Editor; and Jeremy West, Coordinator, Licensing & Brands.

At the American Booksellers Association, David Grogan has been promoted to Director, American Booksellers for Free Expression, Advocacy and Public Policy. Geetha Nathan is now Indie Commerce Senior Manager, and Maria Rodriguez moves up to Meetings and Office Coordinator.

Andrea Posner-Sanchez has been promoted to Senior Executive Editor at Random House Children’s, while Meiko Hashimoto moves up to Editor and Emily Bamford moves up to Publicist. At Ten Speed Press, Windy Dorresteyn has been promoted to Director of Marketing and Publicity. At Ballantine Bantam Dell, Emily Hartley and Elana Seplow-Jolley have both been promoted to Associate Editor.

Paul Whitlatch has been promoted to Executive Editor at Hachette Books.

At Abrams, Nicole Schaefer moves up to Assistant Manager, Children’s Marketing.

At Chronicle, Mirabelle Korn has been promoted to Associate Editor, Art.

DULY NOTED

Poet and academic Elizabeth Alexander has been named President of the Andrew Mellon Foundation, effective in March.

Penguin Young Readers has announced plans for a new imprint, Kokila, to focus on diverse books. Namrata Tripathi, editorial director and associate publisher at Dial, will be publisher, and Joanna Cárdenas will move over from Viking Children’s to serve as editor. The imprint will publish 15 to 20 titles a year, with an expected launch of summer 2019.

National Geographic Kids is launching a middle grade fiction imprint, Under the Stars, this fall. The line will publish one fiction series a year.

Press Box Publicity, the sports book publicity firm, will become a division of Smith Publicity on March 1.

Liz Gately now scouts for Kagge in Norway.

Sanford J. Greenburger Associates now scouts fiction for C.H. Beck in Germany.

KF Literary Scouting now scouts for Mondial in Sweden.