Wednesday, August 09, 2017

Publishers Lunch


Today's Meal


CBS reported second quarter earnings on Monday afternoon and publisher Simon & Schuster built on a good first quarter with more gains, rebounding to a more usual second quarter performance. Sales of $206 million were up $19 million from a year ago, "led by growth in print book sales and digital audio sales," with the additional sales lifting operating income by $2 million to $28 million. (In 2014 they did $211 million in the second quarter, dropping to $199 million in 2015 and $187 million in 2016.)

Results were lifted by the Adams Media acquisition, though ceo Carolyn Reidy notes that they had double-digit growth across the audio, international, and children's divisions, with adult publishing -- where Adams is focused, growing single digits. (Digital audio sales rose 34 percent, as ebooks "declined in dollars by an equal amount," leaving total digital sales flat for the first half of the year.)

People, Etc.

Erin Vandeveer returns to Abrams in the new role of senior production manager, starting August 9. Most recently she was studio manager for St. Martin's.

Alana Yuster has joined Igloo Books as national account manager. Previously she was brand manager at Penguin Random House.

Agnieszka Mizak has been promoted to the new role of managing director for APA publications, publisher of Insight Guides and Berlitz.

Julie Dinneen has joined D4EO Literary Agency as agent, looking for literary fiction, commercial
fiction, women's fiction, all subgenres of romance and select memoir.

Professor of English at Harvard Steph Burt and professor of English at Virginia Tech Carmen Giménez Smith will take over as
poetry editors at The Nation in September, with a plan to "solicit and commission a wide range of American and international poetry and build out a more robust poetry vertical online."

At Harvest House, publisher
LaRae Weikert will retire on August 31 after nearly 32 years at the company. Sherrie Slopianka has been hired to take over as publisher, vp of the Willamette Group, starting August 7. Most recently she was executive director of sales at Worthy Publishing.

The Chicago Tribune's annual Literary Prize, honoring a writer with a great impact on American society, will be
presented to Marilynne Robinson, who "transcends genre in her fiction and essays, speaking to the arc of history and the ambiguities of the human connection." Their Heartland Prize for nonfiction goes to Matthew Desmond's Evicted, and the fiction award goes to Colson Whitehead's The Underground Railroad.

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