Publishers Lunch

Today's Meal

People, Etc.

Trisha de Guzman has joined Farrar, Straus Children's as associate editor. Previously she worked at Rodale.

At Scholastic Trade, Emily Clement has been promoted to executive editor, Harry Potter, Wizarding World and special projects. Amanda Shih has joined as associate editor, nonfiction; she was previously at Tarcher Perigee. Rachel Weinert has moved over as rights and co-edition manager; she was with Scholastic International. Crystal McCoy has joined as publicity manager; she was previously at Little Bee/Sizzle Press.

Stacey Kondla joined The Rights Factory as an associate agent for children's books, based in Calgary. Previously she worked at Scholastic Canada Book Fairs and Indigo Kids.

At Princeton University Press, Laurie Schlesinger has been named associate director of sales and marketing; Sara Henning-Stout has been named senior publicist; and Jodi Price has been named publicist. As part of the launch of PUP's Creative Media Lab—"a hub for visual innovation across book design, advertising, branding, and social media"—Donna Liese was made assistant creative director; Heather Hansen is an advertising & marketing art director; Jessica Massabrook will be design manager; and Meredith McMahon is advertising coordinator.

Co-owner of Anderson's Bookshops Becky Anderson came up in short in the Democratic primary election Tuesday in Illinois' 6th Congressional district. Anderson came in fifth in a field of seven.

Children's author Russell Freedman, 88, died of a series of strokes on March 3. The author of 60 nonfiction books, he won the Newbery Medal for Lincoln: A Photobiography as well as three Newbery Honors, among other awards.

Awards
The American Academy of Arts and Letters announced 15 recipients of its 2018 awards in literature. Clare Cavanagh, Mary Gaitskill, Ishion Hutchinson, Marlon James, Kay Redfield Jamison, Rick Moody, Mary Robison, and Brenda Shaughnessy each won an Arts and Letters Award of $10,000.

Jon Mcgregor won the E. M. Forster Award for a young writer from the United Kingdom or Ireland; Emily Fridlund's History of Wolves was awarded the Sue Kaufman Prize for First Fiction; Noy Holland received the Katherine Anne Porter Award in Literature for "achievements and dedication to the literary profession"; Hannah Lillith Assadi was awarded the Rosenthal Family Foundation Award in Literature for "young writer of considerable literary talent"; Atticus Lish won the Harold D. Vursell Memorial Award in Literature recognizing prose style; Bill Porter won the Thornton Wilder Prize for Translation; and Elaine Scarry received the Morton Dawen Zabel Award in Literature for "a poet, writer of fiction, or critic of progressive, original, and experimental tendencies."

Thomas Pynchon was named the inaugural winner of the $100,000 Christopher Lightfoot Walker Award for lifetime achievement. Academy member Louis Begley said, "Even if Gravity's Rainbow had been his only novel, the contribution to American literature made by this unfailingly political, devastatingly funny, and brilliant writer would have been indelible."

Bookselling
Novelist and founder of the Unbound Book Festival Alex George plans to open a bookstore, Unbound Books, in Columbia, MS late this summer. Carrie Koepke will be a manager at the 3,000-square-foot store.

Audio Distribution
Simon & Schuster has an agreement for Blackstone Audio to manufacture, sell, and distribute on-demand physical CD audiobooks of "hundreds" of titles previously issued solely as digital audiobooks, starting in April. (Simon & Schuster will continue to distribute its standing catalog of regularly produced physical audiobooks.) Simon & Schuster Audio president and publisher Chris Lynch says in the announcement, "Working together with Blackstone for CD-on-demand distribution is another way to expand our reach."