Category: Uncategorized

Harry Potter fan site Pottermore has appointed Anna Rafferty as director of product, creative and content.

In her new job, reporting to c.e.o. Susan L Jurevics, Rafferty will “head up a dedicated team to ensure that Pottermore’s product, content, creative and technology continue to develop and innovate to reflect the changing audience and retail landscape”, said Pottermore.

“I am delighted to welcome such a digital talent to the Pottermore team as we continue to welcome established and new audiences to J K Rowling’s wizarding world,” said Jurevics.

Prior to joining Pottermore Rafferty ran her own consultancy. Between 2003 and 2014 she ran Penguin Books Digital where she was responsible for digital content, products and audience development.

via Anna Rafferty joins Pottermore | The Bookseller.

• On this cold night in January we finally figured out whether Amazon is a good thing or not!I I can’t believe you weren’t there, at the Kaufman Center on West 67th Street in New York City, where, following a cash bar reception, Intelligence Squared U.S. brought together four men of similar age (~55?) to decide whether “Amazon is the reader’s friend.” They were: Author Joe Konrath, Vox editor Matt Yglesias, novelist and former Authors Guild president Scott Turow and former New Republic editor Franklin Foer. Two of them were on one side, and two of them were on the other.

via Four brave white men decide future of publishing — Tech News and Analysis.

Lulu Jr., the children’s division of the self-publishing platform Lulu.com, has teamed up with educational software firm FableVision Learning for a new venture called My Awesome Publishing Company!, a self-publishing platform for kids.

The online book publishing platform teaches kids how to create a book from idea to print edition. The tool guides young writers through writing, production, marketing and distribution until they ultimately publish their own book.

The company is pushing it to both educators as a way to engage kids in the classroom. The tool works on both mobile devices and desktops, so kids can start a project on say a classroom computer and then work on it on their iPad at home, for instance.

via A Self-Publishing Platform for Kids | GalleyCat.

Madeline McIntosh, who was named president of the Penguin Publishing Group last September, put her own stamp on the division last week, shifting the responsibilities of a number of high-ranking editors and publishers, eliminating the positions of two other top executives, and closing the Hudson Street Press and Gotham Books imprints.The most significant shift came at Viking, where longtime president Clare Ferraro was replaced by a new team led by Brian Tart, who had been president and publisher of Dutton, Gotham, and Avery. Tart was named Viking president and publisher, and McIntosh brought in Andrea Schulz as Viking v-p and editor-in-chief. Schulz was previously editor-in-chief at Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. Kate Stark, head of marketing at Riverhead and Putnam, joined Viking as associate publisher and director of marketing and will retain her Riverhead duties, while relinquishing her Putnam responsibilities.

via Big Changes at Penguin Publishing Group.

Is The Girl on the Train on the fast track to becoming the next Gone Girl? Is Paula Hawkins 2015’s answer to literature’s best-selling bad girl, Gillian Flynn?Sure, “Girl” is in both titles. Yep, there are slick young suburban psychos in rotten marriages in this twisty debut thriller from the U.K. But Hawkins’ dark vision also owes a notable debt to that 20th-century master of the macabre, fellow Brit Alfred Hitchcock.

via USATODAY.

Now that Alex Malarkey says his book The Boy Who Came Back from Heaven is, well, malarkey, will other best sellers that have made similar claims come under scrutiny?

via Are best-selling ‘Heaven’ books for real?.

Here are the top 100 best sellers of 2014, based on data from USA TODAY’s Best-Selling Books list tracked between Dec. 30, 2013, and Dec. 28, 2014.

1. The Fault in Our Stars by John Green 2. Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn 3. Divergent by Veronica Roth 4. Insurgent by Veronica Roth 5. Allegiant by Veronica Roth.

via Top 100 USA TODAY best sellers of 2014.

FDR AND THE JEWS, by Richard Breitman and Allan J. Lichtman. (Belknap/Harvard University, $19.95.) What, exactly, did Franklin Roosevelt do during his presidency, from 1933 to 1945, to protect the Jews of Europe from Nazi genocide? This thorough revisiting of the record reveals a concerned leader whose efforts on behalf of Jews were significant yet whose moral role was tempered by the political realities of depression and war.

via Paperback Row – NYTimes.com.

It started life as a short story on social media, but “Slade House” is now set for publication in October 2015, the month in which its fictional conclusion takes place. Mitchell had originally distributed “The Right Sort” as a collection of 280 tweets, commencing on July 14, 2014.But, as explained in a joint statement with publisher Sceptre, it “quickly acquired a life of its own” as “scenes grew, bred and sprouted new scenes.”Eventually, “The Right Sort” became the first of a five-part novel that will see the light of day as “Slade House.”

via David Mitchell’s Twitter novel coming in October – Yahoo News.

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Critically-acclaimed author Marilynne Robinson has written only four novels since 1980, but is widely considered among the country’s best fiction writers. In her latest, “Lila,” Robinson returns to the fictional town of Gilead, Iowa, the setting for her two previous novels, “Home” and the Pulitzer Prize-winning “Gilead.” The book chronicles Lila’s almost feral youth with a drifter named Doll, and her eventual marriage to the Reverend John Ames, a widower. Robinson, 71, spoke with Reuters about writing and “Lila,” which was a finalist for the National Book Award.

via Book Talk: Marilynne Robinson returns to familiar terrain in “Lila” – Yahoo News.