US News from Publishers Lunch:

Amazon Contest; Self-Publishing Convention; Free Pre-Pub eBook

* Amazon and Penguin have selected the 100 semifinalists in the second Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award contest. Now Penguin editors get to browse those manuscripts and select three finalists, to be named May 15.*

For those who remain in self-publishing, trade publishing veteran Karen Mender and longtime book publicist Diane Mancher at One Potata Productions are launching a Self-Published Book Expo, a one-day show in New York on November 9. It will highlight service companies along with individual titles, and offer advice on marketing and publicity.*

Media veteran Thembisa S. Mshaka's PUT YOUR DREAMS FIRST: Handle Your [entertainment] Business, a career guide to the entertainment business told through the stories of 90 dynamic women in music, radio, film, television, theater, dance and new media share is being given away as a free pdf for the next six days in advance of trade publication by HBG's Business Plus on April 23.