Random House SVP and Editor-in-Chief Susan Kamil has been given the additional position of Publisher of the Random House and Dial Press imprints. Tom Perry, EVP, Deputy Publisher of the Random House Publishing Group, will join her at the Random House imprint and will also become Publisher of the Modern Library. Theresa Zoro has been promoted to SVP, Director of Publicity for RHPG and Susan Corcoran has been promoted to VP, Director of Publicity for Ballantine Bantam Dell.

Ben Loehnen and Jofie Ferrari-Adler have been hired as senior editors at Simon & Schuster, reporting to EVP, Publisher Jonathan Karp. Loehnen was most recently at HarperCollins, and Ferrari-Adler was at Grove/Atlantic. Longtime senior editor Amanda Murray has left.

Helen Atsma will join Grand Central Publishing as a senior editor at the end of August, reporting to VP, Editor-in-Chief, Hardcovers, Deb Futter. She was at Henry Holt.

Evan Schnittman has been named to the newly created position of Managing Director, Group Sales & Marketing, Print and Digital, Bloomsbury Publishing, reporting to CEO Nigel Newton. Succeeding Schnittman at Oxford University Press, David Bowers has been promoted to VP, Global Business Development.

Peter Kay has assumed the newly created position of Director of Digital Marketing and Strategy at Norton. He was VP for Product Development at MTV, and prior to that was at Random House as Director of Interactive Media.

HarperCollins Director of Publicity Gretchen Crary is leaving the company after six years to start a book publicity and online marketing firm, February Partners. Future partners will be announced shortly. E-mail gretchen [at] februarypartners dot com.

John Groton will be joining National Book Network as VP of Sales. Groton has held senior and executive sales positions at Simon & Schuster, Random House, Globe Pequot, and most recently Nicholas Brealey. He will be based in Stonington, CT.

Michael Sittenfeld has joined the Metropolitan Museum of Art as Managing Editor, a position recently held by Margaret Chace, who moved to Rizzoli/Skira. Sittenfeld was Director of Publications at the Jewish Museum.

Kaplan has hired Jennifer Wendell as Sales and Business Development Director. She was most recently Marketing Manager at DK. Also at DK, Lauren Steffens has been hired as Licensed Marketing Manager. She was at DC Comics.

Matt Brown has been named SVP, Scholastic and President of Klutz. He takes over from recently retired co-founder John Cassidy. Brown was co-founder and “Play Czar” of big BOING, LLC.

Abrams Artists Agency announced that Steve Ross, former President and Group Publisher of the Collins division of HarperCollins and Publisher of Crown, is joining the company as Director of the newly formed book division. He may be reached at steve.ross [at] abramsartny.com.

Stacy Boyd has been named Senior Editor at Silhouette. She was editor of feature and custom publishing at Harlequin. Krista Stroever has started as Senior Editor at Harlequin’s Mira. She was Senior Editor at Silhouette Desire.

Lisa Richards has joined Macmillan as National Account Manager, representing the Children’s Publishing Group imprints to retail accounts serviced by Levy, including Wal-Mart, Sam’s Club, and Target. She reports to Director of Children’s Sales Mark von Bargen. She previously worked for TOKYOPOP, Viz, and Prima.

Charlie and Jeremy Nurnberg, who founded Imagine Publishing and recently sold it to Charlesbridge Publishing, have both joined Charlesbridge. Charlie will be VP, President and Publisher of the imprint, and Jeremy will be VP, Sales. Father and son previously worked at Sterling, Charlie as CEO and Jeremy as VP Sales.

Mindy Chon has been appointed as Manager, International Sales Operations for Random House, reporting to Cyrus Kheradi. She was most recently Assistant Manager of International Sales at Simon & Schuster.

Janet Corson is heading a new venture called Educational Initiatives for becker&mayer!. She was COO and Publisher at Eaglemont. Kjersti Egerdahl has been promoted to editor at becker&mayer!.

Jenny Wapner has gone to Ten Speed Press as Senior Editor. She was Senior Acquisitions Editor at University of California Press.

Reka Simonsen has joined Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Children’s as Executive Editor. She was Senior Editor at Holt Children’s. Ayesha Mirza has joined Houghton Mifflin Harcourt as Marketing Manager in the adult marketing department, in the New York office. She was most recently a marketing manager at Macmillan.

Simon & Schuster Children’s has hired Deane Norton as Associate Director of Sub Rights. She was most recently Sub Rights Manager for Macmillan Children’s FSG and Roaring Brook Press imprints.

Adam Friedstein has joined Anderson Literary Management as an agent. He was previously at Trident Media Group. . . . Jason Pinter will join the Waxman Literary Agency as an agent on August 2. He was most recently a writer, and previously an editor at St. Martin’s and Crown . . . Rachel Vogel has been named Associate Agent and International Rights Manager at Movable Type Literary Group. She was an assistant at Lippincott Massie McQuilkin. . . . Foladé Bell has joined Serendipity Literary Agency as an associate agent.

John W. Byram has been named Director at University of New Mexico Press. He had been Editor-in-Chief and Director of Development at University Press of Florida.

Bess Braswell has joined Scholastic as Associate Director of Marketing, Paperbacks. She was a Marketing Manager at Simon & Schuster Children’s. David Sandler has joined Scholastic as Associate Director of Digital Marketing & Advertising. He was Manager of Marketing and Social Media for American Express’s Establishment Services.

PROMOTIONS AND INTERNAL CHANGES

Lots of promotions in children’s books this summer: Candlewick Press President and Publisher Karen Lotz has been named Joint Group Managing Director of the Walker Group, consisting of Candlewick, Walker UK, and Walker Australia, effective immediately. In July 2011, David Heatherwick will step down after more than 20 years as Group Managing Director and Lotz will become sole Group Managing Director. Heatherwick will continue with the Walker Group as Group Finance Director.

Farrin Jacobs has been promoted to Editorial Director at HarperCollins Children’s and continues to report to SVP and Associate Publisher, Fiction, Elise Howard. She was Executive Editor. Also at HarperCollins Children’s, Erica Sussman has been promoted to Senior Editor, Jean McGinley to Director of Subsidiary Rights, and Alpha Wong to Assistant Director of Subsidiary Rights. . . . Casey McIntyre has been promoted to Publicist at Penguin Young Reader’s Group, from Associate Publicist. Little, Brown Books for Young Readers has promoted Connie Hsu and Kate Sullivan both to Associate Editor; they were assistant editors. . . . At Simon & Schuster Children’s, Bernadette Cruz has been promoted to Associate Publicist. . . . Lisa Sandell has been promoted to Executive Editor, Scholastic Press.

At McGraw-Hill Professional, Mary Glenn has been promoted to Associate Publisher, Business Management and Finance, from Editorial Director.

Jennifer Banks has been promoted to Senior Editor at Yale University Press, where she was an editor.

At Random House, Karen Fink has been promoted to Publicity Manager, and Maria Braeckel and Kristina Miller have moved up to publicist positions. Moises Martinez has been named Director, Spanish Language. He was Sales Manager.

At Kaplan, Brett Sandusky has been promoted to Director of Marketing. He was Marketing Manager.

DULY NOTED

The LA Times has named Jon Thurber as its new Books Editor. The position was previously held by David Ulin, who was recently named book critic. For the past year, Thurber worked as Managing Editor, print. Prior to that, he spent eleven years as obituary editor.

UPCOMING EVENTS

The Great American Bargain Book Show takes place in Boston August 19–20. In conjunction, ShelfAwareness notes, the New England Independent Booksellers Association, New Atlantic Independent Booksellers Association, and Southern Independent Booksellers Alliance are jointly sponsoring two workshops: “Remainder Buying—Plain, Simple and Profitable,” and “EESY CHIT: Easy, Effective Strategies You Can Happily Implement Today.”

The 24th annual Goddard Riverside Gala takes place on October 19 at 583 Park Avenue (rather than the past venue of Tavern on the Green), and honors Clyde Anderson, Chairman, President and CEO, Books-A-Million.

The International Federation of Reproduction Rights Organizations will hold its Annual General Meeting, hosted by the Copyright Clearance Center, in Boston October 25–28.

IN MEMORIAM

Les Pockell died on July 26 after a long illness. He was VP, Associate Publisher for Hachette Book Group, and an author. A funeral will be held on Saturday, July 31, and a memorial service is to be scheduled for a later date.

Codex’s Early Read Book Preview measures book and author sales potential based on book shopper purchase interest. The company regularly conducts online polls of book consumers across major fiction and nonfiction book categories. The preview measures their spontaneous “shopping response” to 50 books equally divided between current New York Times bestsellers and titles in development. The jacket copy study took place from March 30 through April 4 and surveyed 7,065 book shoppers nationwide, including 2,362 literary fiction and 1,308 women’s fiction buyers.

The job of writing jacket copy shouldn’t be foisted off on editorial assistants—it is the second most important book purchase factor (after favorite author). “I was heartened to see how much emphasis readers seem to place on real information and details about the story itself,” says Mitch Hoffman, Executive Editor at Grand Central Publishing. Hoffman helped Hildick-Smith with this survey, and the jacket copy for Grand Central’s First Family by David Baldacci scored higher than any other title in the study. “Certainly all these other pieces of ephemera, reviews, bestsellers, endorsement information, they always find that helpful, but the story is the thing. That reinforces an idea I always wanted to believe, that even in the middle of everything else we do, the book is the thing.”

Flap copy is especially important for fiction. And title and cover impact are closely related to the impact of jacket copy. If the flap copy defies the expectation created by the cover and title—if, for instance, the cover of the book leads the reader to expect a thriller but the flap copy identifies it as horror—readers are less likely to buy it.

The lede is the most important element of the jacket copy. “We make sure that we’re absolutely clear about our lede, what makes the book special, and we announce that as clearly and concisely as possible right at the top,” says Hoffman. “With so many books screaming for readers’ attention, you might only have that first few seconds to make an impact, so you have to identify what makes a book special early on. Readers might not make it to the second paragraph of your gorgeously crafted copy. It’s something every journalist knows, that’s worth our keeping in mind.”

Survey respondents ranked other common elements of jacket copy as less important. Only 13% of literary fiction readers are most influenced by praise from the New York Times, for instance, and they care even less about praise from publishing industry magazines like Publishers Weekly (10%). Not surprisingly, the influence of reviews decreases further for readers of other genres. The importance of various elements of jacket copy also varies by age. Younger book shoppers are more interested in character detail and brief promotional statements or quotes—31% of readers under 18, for instance, said they’d be most influenced by a statement like “Sometimes what happens in Vegas follows you home.” And even though they might have little else in common, the under-18 crowd shares the preference for a snappy promotional statement with readers over 65, 25% of whom are most influenced by these statements. Younger and older shoppers don’t want to work hard to figure out what a book is about, so flap copy aimed at them should cut to the chase.

Despite all of the above, there’s still no magic formula for writing perfect jacket copy. “I spend a fair amount of time developing jacket copy options for publishers, and we’ve been measuring the impact of jacket copy for over five years,” says Hildick-Smith, “but I’m still not able to consistently tell if a version of jacket copy is going to do well or not! Part of that is the crucial interplay between title/cover and copy, and part of it is the fact that one person can’t perceive another’s intuitive response to a creative message. It keeps this work endlessly fascinating, and humbling, as a result.”

HarperCollins announced a new management structure following Jane Friedman’s June 4 resignation and the appointment of Brian Murray as President and CEO HarperCollins Publishers Worldwide. Michael Morrison was also promoted to President and Publisher, U.S. General Books and Canada, and Victoria Barnsley has been promoted to CEO and Publisher HCUK and International, overseeing the UK, Australia, New Zealand, India, and South Africa.

Bob Miller, whose new publishing venture is called HarperStudio, has hired Debbie Stier from Morrow as SVP, Associate Publisher, though she will also be Director, Digital Marketing Development for General Books at HC. Julia Cheiffetz has been hired as Senior Editor. She was previously at Random House.

Steve Black has been named Director of Sales for Oxmoor House, in the New York office.

Matt Schwartz has joined Random House Publishing Group as Director, Digital Strategy and Business Development, reporting to Andrea Sheehan. He was most recently Director of Online Marketing for the Children’s Publishing division at Simon & Schuster. Meanwhile, Christina Pecorale has moved from Random House to S&S, where she’s the new Director of National Accounts.

Felicia Frazier has been named SVP, Director of Sales at the Penguin Young Readers Group. She had been VP, Sales Director for national accounts at Random House.

Tim Mak is returning to Random House. He will be joining the Academic Marketing Department as Marketing Coordinator on July 7. He was most recently at H20 Associates. Prior to that, he was at HarperCollins and Ballantine.

Karen Cooper is the new Publisher of Adams Media, having left the book division of parent company F+W.

Taline Najarian has been named Director of Special Sales for Scholastic.

Layoffs at HarperCollins Children’s Books: Anne Miller Attanas, Ruth Katcher, Melanie Donovan, Claire Hutton, Adriana Dominguez, and Mary Albi.

Tom Stewart has left Harvard Business School Press, where he was Editor of the Harvard Business Review.

John Nee, SVP of Business Development at DC Comics, is leaving the company. However, David Hyde, DC Comics VP of publicity, declined to confirm the report and said that DC Comics does not comment on personnel matters.

Leigh Haber has stepped down as VP Editorial Director at Rodale’s Modern Times imprint. As a result of Haber’s departure, Rodale will close the Modern Times imprint after publishing all the titles currently signed up under it.

Ann Campbell has left Broadway, where she was a Senior Editor. She plans to take on freelance editing and writing starting in September and can be reached at annwcampbell08 [at] gmail.com. The company is looking for her successor.

Joy de Menil has been named Executive Editor of Viking, reporting to Clare Ferraro. She joins the company from The Atlantic Monthly, where she was a senior editor, and will work from both Washington and New York.

Genoveva Llosa has joined Ten Speed Press as a Senior Editor acquiring business, career, mind-body-spirit, and parenting books. She was previously at Collins, Crown, and HBS Press.

Beryl Needham has left Borders, where she was mostly recently VP, Merchandising.

Emily Carleton has joined McGraw-Hill Professional as an editor in the Consumer group. She was an Associate Editor at Wiley.

Anne Savarese has been named Executive Editor of Princeton University Press.

Phoenix Books has hired Gray Peterson as VP Sales and Marketing. He headed special/mass market/trade sales for Scholastic and was most recently VP of sales at Dalmatian Press.

Until Labor Day, when she officially starts at Amazon.com in Luxembourg, Madeline McIntosh can be reached at madeline.mcintosh [at] gmail.com.

PROMOTIONS AND INTERNAL CHANGES

Bill Thomas, SVP, Editor-in-Chief, has been promoted to the additional position of Publisher, General Adult Books, Doubleday Publishing Group. Thomas named Stacy Creamer, Deputy Editorial Director, Broadway Books, as Editor-in-Chief, Broadway, and Charles Conrad, Broadway’s Editorial Director, Paperbacks, as the new Deputy Editorial Director for Doubleday.

Author Solutions, Inc. has appointed Diane Gedymin to the position of Executive Editorial Director. Gedymin will oversee editorial for all ASI’s author services brands, including AuthorHouse, iUniverse, and Wordclay. Gedymin had previously worked for iUniverse.

Katie Rose has been named VP Director of Marketing for adult books at Houghton Mifflin Trade & Reference. She was VP of Marketing for the college division.

Arthur A. Levine has been named VP Publisher, Arthur A. Levine Books. He was previously VP and Editorial Director of the imprint.

Grand Central Publishing Executive Editor Rick Wolff has added the title of Publisher and Editor-in-Chief of the Business Plus imprint, while retaining his current position within GCP. Natalie Kaire is a newly named Senior Editor at Grand Central Publishing.

Paul Taunton has been promoted to to Editor at Random House. Paul will be focusing on ESPN Books in his new position.

Roger Labrie has been promoted to Senior Editor at S&S.

John Fagan has added another title. He is now Marketing Director of eBooks as well as VP and Director of Marketing for Penguin Books and Executive Director, Academic Marketing and Sales, Penguin Group.

Mike Spring, who joined John Wiley & Sons when Hungry Minds was acquired in 2001, is retiring as travel publisher but will become Director of Special Projects and work closely with Wiley’s travel publishing team. Ensley Eikenburg has been promoted to Associate Publisher/Associate Marketing Director of the travel program at Wiley. She has been Associate Marketing Director of travel and reference publishing. She continues to report to Claire Griffin.

Richard Rhorer is taking on the new position of Director of Digital Business development for Macmillan. He has been Director of Marketing for the Henry Holt adult imprints.

More HC news: Kathy Schneider has been promoted to SVP. Seale Ballenger has been promoted to VP, Group Publicity Director, for William Morrow, Morrow Cookbooks, HarperEntertainment, and Eos. Dee Dee De Bartlo has been promoted to Senior Director of Publicity and new initiatives for Morrow, HarperEntertainment, Eos, and Morrow Cookbooks. Richard Ljoenes has been promoted to Vice President, Senior Art Director at Collins.

Baker & Taylor has promoted David Cully to President, Retail Markets. He will add domestic and international retail book and entertainment sales to his merchandising, purchasing, and Baker & Taylor Marketing Services responsibilities. Bill Preston, SVP Books, and Frank Wolbert, SVP Entertainment, now report to Cully.

Michael Connor has been named senior editor of the Quality Paperback Book Club, and he will continue to have editorial responsibility for InsightOut Books. QPB executive editor Gary Jansen has left the company.

DULY NOTED

The American Bookseller Association’s marketing cooperative, Book Sense, has changed its name to IndieBound. Member stores no longer have to pay a separate fee to participate, but just have to be ABA members. Authors can be affiliates of the Book Sense/IndieBound website and earn similar affiliate fees as with Amazon or Powell’s.

The Chronicle of Higher Education notes that “540 press directors, editors, digital technologists, marketing and business specialists, and other interested parties, including representatives from Google and Amazon.com” attended the AAUP’s annual meeting in Montreal from June 26–29. Topics covered included the move toward open access, problems of over-publishing, Amazon and POD, and, of course, returns. Google Book Search seemed to be one of the few areas where (almost) everyone involved was happy to be so. The 2009 Annual Meeting will take place from June 18–21 in Philadelphia.

UPCOMING EVENTS

On July 31 at 6:30 PM, Mad. Sq. Reads, Madison Square Park Conservancy’s free series of summer readings, presents The Wisest, Kindest Voice: A Celebration of the Work and Life of William Maxwell, featuring Christopher Carduff, Benjamin Cheever, Edward Hirsch, Daniel Menaker, and Stewart O’Nan.

Deb Futter has moved to Grand Central Publishing as VP, Editor-in-Chief. She was VP, Deputy Editorial Director at Doubleday. Michelle Rapkin has joined Hachette’s Center Street imprint as Executive Editor, reporting to Rolf Zettersten. She had been VP, Director of Doubleday Religion before leaving there in 2005. Amy Pierpont has been named Editorial Director at Forever and Senior Editor at Grand Central. She had been at Clarkson Potter.

Reed Boyd VP, Sales Director International and Special Sales, has left Random House but may still be reached at rboyd[at]randomhouse.com.

Daisy Kline has been named Director of Marketing and Brand Management at Scholastic Media. Ann Forstenzer has joined Scholastic as Director, Cross-Channel, reporting to Jazan Higgins, VP, Cross-Channel Strategy. She had been at Learning Resources. Chris Stengel has joined Scholastic as Associate Art Director.

Douglas Pocock, EVP Egmont USA, which will launch in January 2008, has hired Elizabeth Law as VP and Publisher. She was previously at Simon & Schuster. Egmont will be distributed by Random House.

Angela Bole is moving to John Wiley & Son’s Professional & Trade division as Events Manager. She was previously at BISG. She may be reached at angelabole[at]gmail.com. Karen Forster, previously at SPi Publishing, succeeds her.

Following Neil Bogaty’s desparture for Adobe, Michael Smith has been named Executive Director of the International Digital Publishing Forum (IDPF). Prior to joining the IDPF Smith was at Harlequin Enterprises where he managed eBook and book production services.

Deb Brody has been named Executive Editor at Harlequin. She had been most recently at McGraw-Hill. . . . Furaha Norton has moved to The New Press as Editor. She was most recently an editor at Vintage/Anchor. Joseph Williams is the new CFO of The New Press. He previously held positions at The New York Times Company, the Reader’s Digest and McGraw-Hill.

After 21 years, Nancy Hall closed her business last summer but has reopened as The Book Shop, Ltd., offering full-service book development. Contact info@thebookshop ltd.com or 917-388-2493.

Kevin Hamric has been named VP Sales & Marketing for the Quayside Group. He was at The Taunton Press. Mike Hejny has left Motorbooks, which was recently acquired by Quayside.

Darcy Cohan has joined Chronicle Books as Director of Publicity. Cohan was most recently Publicity Manager for Avalon Publishing Group and, prior to that, ran her own publicity firm. She replaces Andrea Burnett who is returning to her own pr firm.

Judy Pray has moved to Clarkson Potter as an Editor. She was at Black Dog & Leventhal. . . . Ann Treistman has joined Skyhorse Publishing as Senior Editor. Most recently she was a freelancer at STC and Abrams Image.

Scott Lubeck has joined NewsStand as VP and General Manager of its newspaper and magazine digital publishing service division. He was most recently at Harvard Business School Publishing.

Alex Clark has been named Deputy Editor at Granta. She had been Deputy Literary Editor at the New York Observer.

Krupp Kommunications (K2) announces that Tiffany Alvarado has joined the agency as Senior Account Executive. She comes to the agency from Planned Television Arts.

PROMOTIONS

HarperCollins announced that Larry Nevins has been promoted to the newly created position of Chief Supply Chain Officer and Senior Vice President of Global Digital Operations. He joined the company in 2001 as SVP of Operations and Supply Chain and established the Digital Publishing Services department in 2005.

Sanyu Dillon, Associate Publisher and Director of Marketing at Random House, has been named VP.
Rachel Bender has been promoted to Director of Consumer Products at Scholastic. Abigail McAden has been promoted to Publishing Director, Paperbacks for Scholastic Paperbacks and Point. She was previously Editorial Director for Point. Cheryl Klein has been promoted to Senior Editor, Arthur A. Levine Books. She was previously Editor. AnnMarie Harris has been promoted to Senior Editor, Licensed Publishing. She was previously Editor.

Lizette Serrano has been promoted to Associate Director for Trade Conventions, Conferences, Events and Author Programs at Scholastic. She was previously Senior Manager. Barrie Reinhold has been promoted to Associate Manager of Sales and Marketing Operations. She was previously Assistant Manager.

Beryl Needham and Kathryn Popoff have both been promoted to VP, Merchandising, at Borders, reporting to EVP Merchandising and Marketing, Rob Gruen.

Michael Homler has been promoted to Editor at St. Martin’s, reporting to Charlie Spicer. . . . Erica Sanders-Foege has been promoted to Senior Editor, books at The Taunton Press. She had been Editor.
Laura Pillar has been promoted to Director of Publicity at Goldberg McDuffie. In addition to continuing to work on general non-fiction and fiction titles, she now heads up GMC’s Business Division.

Leslie Hulse has been named to the new role of VP, Digital Business Development at HarperCollins. Rachel Chou has been named to the position of VP, Online Product Development and Operations. Both report to Carolyn Pittis. And Mumtaz Mustafa has been promoted to Art Director of Avon Trade and Rayo. Milan Bozic has been promoted to Art Director of Harper Perennial and Harper paperbacks.
Michael Campbell has been named Director of Sales and Marketing at Graphic Arts Center Publishing Company. He was Corporate and Specialty Sales Manager and replaces Mike Jones who’s moving to Keen Communications, LLC.

Recorded Books announced the promotion of Scott Williams to President. He replaces David Berset, who has left the company “to pursue other interests.” Williams joined Recorded Books in 1992 as a Public Library Sales Representative.

Promotions at American Booksellers Association include: Jill Perlstein has been named Director of Member Services; Kristen Gilligan has been named Director of Meetings and Events; Mark Nichols has been promoted to Senior Director of Publishing Initiatives; Dan Cullen has been named Senior Director, Editorial Content; Meg Smith has been named Chief Marketing Officer; Len Vlahos has been named Chief Program Officer, and will continue to oversee BookSense.com.

UPCOMING EVENTS

The 20th Independent and Small Press Book Fair will take place on December 1-2 at the New York Center of Independent Publishing (NYCIP), at 20 West 44th Street. More than 100 presses from the U.S. and abroad will exhibit. For more information contact the NYCIP at 212-764-7021, visit www.nycip.org, or e-mail Christopher de la Torre at christopher[at]nycip.org.
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In conjunction with the Book Fair, the New York Center for Independent Publishing hosts its first Mini-Rights Fair on Friday, November 30th at 2pm. This event is designed to provide publishers with information regarding sub-rights and foreign rights sales. Activities include an educational panel and a keynote address from Pat Schroeder, President of the American Association of Publishers.
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On December 13 from 6-8 Peter Mayer and The Overlook Press will be honored at the NYCIP Annual Benefit. Ed Victor will present the Poor Richard Award and Sara Nelson will host. Please contact nycip@nycip.org for further information.
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Brooklyn Academy of Music’s Eat, Drink & Be Literary program starts again in January, with George Saunders talking on January 17, and Deborah Eisenberg on February 7th. For details go to: http://www.bam.org/ events/readings.aspx

DULY NOTED

What has briefly been called Direct Group North America will now be known as Bertelsmann Direct North America.
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A memorial service for Jane Pasanen will be Friday, November 30 at 3:00pm, at the Church of St. Luke in the Fields, 487 Hudson Street, New York City. Pasenen was founder of the Chelsea Forum.
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And from Workman comes The Bad President Countdown Calendar. It contains 488 days of quotes and quips that will make you laugh and/or cry right through January 20, 2009, when George W. Bush vacates the White House. If you’d like a free copy, send an email to James Wehrle (james[at]workman.com).

Susan Reich is re-joining PGW where she had worked as VP Marketing from 1990 to 1995, in the role of President. Most recently she served as the President and COO of Avalon Publishing Group, one of PGW’s clients. She reports to David Steinberger. Reporting directly to Reich are Kevin Votel, Eric Kettunen, Roaxanne Schwartz, Sean Shoemaker and Kim Wylie (who will also have a dotted line reporting relationship to Matty Goldberg). In an unrelated announcement, Charlie Winton’s new publishing venture, Winton, Shoemaker & Co., LLC has acquired Soft Skull Press. The company will be renamed Counterpoint, LLC when the Soft Skull and previously announced acquisition of Counterpoint close in June. Soft Skull’s Publisher Richard Nash will be an Executive Editor at Counterpoint and Editorial Director of the Soft Skull imprint. Nash will be based in New York City. Meanwhile, Trish Hoard, Co-founder and Associate Publisher of Shoemaker & Hoard which was acquired by the group earlier this year, will now join SkyHorse Publishing as Managing Editor.

Peter Clifton, currently President & CEO of Ingram Periodicals Inc, International, Ingram Library Services, and Tennessee Book Company and Senior VP of Ingram Book Group, is leaving the company at the end of June. He can be reached at 615-424-4645 (cell), or 615-352-8038. His email address after June 30 is pclif@comcast.net.

HarperCollins has appointed Brenda Bowen to the newly created position of VP Publisher of a yet to be named imprint at HC Children’s Books. Bowen will report to President and Publisher Susan Katz.

Brian Belfiglio has joined Hilsinger-Mendelson East as Publicity Director. Most recently he was Marketing Director at Workman.

Although Hachette’s U.K.-based Octopus Publishing Group has acquired selected assets of MQ Publications, MQP Founder and Publisher Zaro Weil, who owns the MQP name and logo, plans to move to MQP’s New York office. Carol Judy Leslie, a former Publisher of Bulfinch Press, will join her at MQP USA.

Among the 280 people made redundant at Bookspan after Bertelsmann took over and merged it into its BMG division (see PT April, May 2007), is Christine Zikas (christinezikas@ yahoo.com), Executive Editor of Madison Park Press. Prior to joining Bookspan, Zikas was a Senior Editor at Berkley.

Rebecca Oliver has joined Endeavor’s New York book division as a literary agent. She will oversee foreign and domestic subsidiary rights and work alongside Richard Abate. Oliver had been at Grand Central as Associate Director of Subsidiary Rights. . . . Emmanuelle Alspaugh has joined Wendy Sherman Associates as an agent. She was previously at The Creative Culture.

With the departure of Co-founder, Editor and Publisher, Shay Totten for Chelsea Green, The Vermont Guardian announced it had published its last edition.

Carol Roeder has been named Director of Publishing at Lucas Licensing. Previously she was VP, Consumer Products for VIZ Media, and prior to that she worked for S&S Children’s Publishing. . . Meanwhile Heidi North has accepted the position of Art Director for Simon Scribbles. She worked most recently at Sterling Publishing.

At Entertainment Rights, Deborah Dugan will have overall responsibility for the day-to-day running of the U.S. operations (including Canada), which encompasses Entertainment Rights U.S., Classic Media and Big Idea. Dugan was most recently at Disney.

Del Rey has hired Liz Scheier as Senior Editor. She was previously at NAL/Penguin. . . . . Holtzbrinck has hired Jaime Ariza as VP, Special Markets. He was most recently Director of Custom Publishing at S&S.

Simon Dessain, COO of Publishing Technology (formerly known as Vista) and former CEO of Ingenta, has announced his departure from the company, following the merger of the two companies earlier this year.

Mark Eastment has been named Publications Director at the V&A in London. He was Director of Sales and marketing for Antique Collectors’ Club in the UK and before that held a similar position with the Tate Gallery.

Zondervan announced its president and CEO, Doug Lockhart, has stepped down from his position effective June 1, 2007. Former long-time president and CEO, Bruce Ryskamp, who retired from Zondervan in 2005 but has remained in a consulting role, will return to serve as interim president and CEO.

Avalon Publicity Director Karen Auerbach is leaving at the end of June but will continue to freelance for Perseus through the end of the year. She can be reached at karenruthauerbach@ gmail.com.

Gary Krebs has joined Globe Pequot as Group Publisher, responsible for editorial functions across all imprints. He was brought in by former Adams Media colleague Scott Watrous.

Kathy Kiernan has left Black Dog & Leventhal. Judy Courtade recently went to BD&L as Sales Director. . . . Scott Haidle has joined Creative Publishing International as National Account Sales Manager in the home improvement channel.

Nicole Bond, previously at Random House, has been named Associate Director, Foreign Rights for Grand Central Publishing.

Liz Van Doren who left Harcourt during its recent cutbacks may now be reached at LEETS215@aol.com.

PROMOTIONS

Brian Murray has been promoted to the newly created position of President of HarperCollins Worldwide. In this new role he will work closely with Jane Friedman “identifying and directing the company’s worldwide growth.” Also at HarperCollins, Emily Takoudes, who came from S&S in May 2005, has been promoted to Senior Editor. She has edited for Ecco. Jennifer Brehl announced that Diana Gill has been promoted to Executive Editor for the Eos and William Morrow imprints. Christine Boyd, Director of Marketing for Harper, has been promoted to VP Marketing.

Sonny Mehta announced that Andrew Miller, Senior Editor at Vintage/Anchor, has been named Senior Editor at Knopf.

Tim Ditlow is giving up his position as VP and Publisher of Listening Library to become VP and publisher at large for Random House Audio Group, reporting to Madeline McIntosh. Amy Metsch has been promoted to the new role of Editorial Director for the Random House Audio Group.

At Free Press, Heidi Metcalfe has been promoted to Publicity Manager.

At S&S Children’s Brooke Linder has moved to Little Simon as Editor. Kimberly Lauber has been promoted to Marketing Associate, Education & Library. Greg Stadnyk has been promoted to Associate Art Director. Orli Zuravicky has been promoted to the position of Editor, Simon Spotlight.
Ashley Gordon at Lightning Source, Inc. will take on the role of Director of Channel Development, moving on from various positions in executive sales.
And at St. Martin’s, Nancy Trypuc has been promoted to Senior Director of Creative Services. Previously, she was Director of Advertising and Promotion.

JUNE EVENTS

The National Book Critics Circle has two events at BEA: Friday, June 1 in Room 1E06 11:30 a.m.-12:30 p.m. “Ethics in Book Reviewing: The More Things Change…?” Carlin Romano moderates Christopher Hitchens, John Leonard, Francine Prose, Sam Tanenhaus, and David Ulin. On June 3 in Room 1E11 10:00 -11:00: “The Crisis in American Book Pages; Newspaper book reviews are in a state of change. Where are we going? Where have we been?” Also check out http://bookcriticscircle.blogspot.com/

DULY NOTED

Bloomsbury announces the launch of Bloomsbury Press, whose first list debuts in January 2008. Peter Ginna (who was previously at OUP), is its Publisher and Editorial Director, and its mission is to publish “the best serious nonfiction being written today.”
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The Small Press Center launched its new name and logo: “Our new name more accurately describes who we are,” said Lloyd J. Jassin, Chair of the New York Center for Independent Publishing (NYCIP) Executive Committee. Karin Taylor remains as Executive Director. Go to www. Nycip.org for details. Phone, fax and email will remain the same.

ON THE MOVE

As a result of WRC Media parent company’s acquisition of The Reader’s Digest Association, Weekly Reader and its sister companies have been merged into Reader’s Digest and its offices will be located at 1 Reader’s Digest Road, Pleasantville, NY 10570. . . . Book Industry Study Group, Inc. (BISG) has moved to 370 Lexington Ave. (between 40th and41st) Suite 900 New York, NY 10017. . . . Disney Publishing Worldwide is moving to White Plains. The publishing division, currently in offices at 114 Fifth Avenue in New York, is relocating 175 of the division’s 225 employees to the new location. Twenty editorial staffers from Disney Press, Hyperion Books for Children and Disney Editions will remain in Manhattan relocating to a “midtown location near Grand Central.” The move is scheduled to get underway in October and be completed by December. . . . Archipelago Books has moved to 232 Third Ave. #A111, Brooklyn NY 11215. The phone and fax will remain the same, Phone: (718) 852-6134, Fax: (718) 852-6135. .

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.