Pratchett’s The Shepherd’s Crown

This September Penguin Random House will be publishing The Shepherd’s Crown, the final Discworld novel by Sir Terry Pratchett. Editor Kirsten Armstrong bought Exclusive World All Language rights (excluding US, US dependencies and Philippines) from Colin Smythe of Colin Smythe Ltd.

The Shepherd’s Crown is the fifth Discworld novel featuring young witch Tiffany Aching.  Previous titles in the Tiffany Aching sequence include: The Wee Free Men, A Hat Full of Sky, Wintersmith and I Shall Wear Midnight.

via The Shepherd’s Crown: Penguin Random House to publish final Discworld novel from Sir Terry Pratchett | | Terry PratchettTerry Pratchett.

Penguin And Author Solutions Sued For Deceptive Practices

Three authors have begun a federal class action suit against Penguin and its self-publishing services provider, Author Solutions, seeking damages of more than $5 mn. Says Publishers Weekly: The suit, which seeks class action status, alleges that Author Solutions misrepresents itself, luring authors in with claims that its books can compete with “traditional publishers,” offering “greater speed, higher royalties, and more control for its authors.” The company then profits from “fraudulent” practices, the complaint alleges, including “delaying publication, publishing manuscripts with errors to generate fees, and selling worthless services, or services that fail to accomplish what they promise.” The suit also alleges that Author Solutions fails to pay its authors the royalties they are due. Publishers Weekly reports that the suit has been filed in the Southern District of New York and will be heard by Judge Denise Cote, who is current hearing the ebook price-fixing case.

via Penguin And Author Solutions Sued For Deceptive Practices.

YouTube’s “Sunshine Girl” Comes to Print

Nearly five years ago, a chirpy, animated 16-year-old named Paige McKenzie uploaded a 68-second video to YouTube. “Hey everybody, so, I know this is a little strange,” she says, then confides that her house is haunted and she aims to capture the ghost on camera. Continue reading the main story ‘We Moved Into a Haunted House’ Video by The Haunting of Sunshine Girl NetworkMore than 130 million views later, Ms. McKenzie’s mockumentary web series, “The Haunting of Sunshine Girl,” has become a full-time job.

Each week, Ms. McKenzie spends 80 hours shooting, acting in and editing the show, and frenetically trading messages with viewers.

via YouTube’s ‘Sunshine Girl’ Comes to Print – NYTimes.com.

Sneak Peek: Purity | Work in Progress

Young Pip Tyler doesn’t know who she is. She knows that her real name is Purity, that she’s saddled with $130,000 in student debt, that she’s squatting with anarchists in Oakland, and that her relationship with her mother—her only family—is hazardous. But she doesn’t have a clue who her father is, why her mother has always concealed her own real name, or how she can ever have a normal life.

Enter the Germans. A glancing encounter with a German peace activist leads Pip to an internship in South America with the Sunlight Project, an organization that traffics in all the secrets of the world—including, Pip hopes, the secret of her origins. TSP is the brainchild of Andreas Wolf, a charismatic provocateur who rose to fame in the chaos following the fall of the Berlin Wall. Now on the lam in Bolivia, Andreas is drawn to Pip for reasons she doesn’t understand, and the intensity of her response to him upends her conventional ideas of right and wrong.

via Sneak Peek: Purity | Work in Progress.

Hemingway, Saunders Among Authors in Anthology

Hemingway, Saunders Among Authors in Short Story Anthology - ABC News

Ernest Hemingway, Jhumpa Lahiri, and George Saunders will be among 40 authors represented in an anthology this October of the best short fiction of the past century. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, which announced the book Monday, began publishing story anthologies in 1915 and will feature highlights in “100 Years of The Best American Short Stories.” A leading contemporary writer, Lorrie Moore, is the editor. The anthology features classics such as Hemingway’s “My Old Man” and John Cheevers’ “The Enormous Radio” plus contemporary works by Lahiri, Saunders, and ZZ Packer among others. The title says “Best American,” but Canadians are welcome, too; so, Alice Munros’ “Friend of My Youth” is included. Overlooked by the editor was the author of such acclaimed stories as “People Like That Are the Only People Here”: Lorrie Moore. via Hemingway, Saunders Among Authors in Short Story Anthology – ABC News.

Watershed Kid’s Book Revitalized

A playful picture book about a little girl named Heather and her two happy mommies was a cultural and legal flashpoint 25 years ago, angering conservatives over the morality of same-sex parenting and landing libraries at the center of community battles over placement in the childrens stacks.Today, Heather — of “Heather Has Two Mommies” — has a lot more company in books for young kids about different kinds of families, but hers was out of print and seemed visually dated. Thats why creator Leslea Newman decided on a new version, updating the look of her watershed story with fresh illustrations from a new artist and tweaking the text to streamline.

via AP Exclusive: Watershed kids book freshened up | Boston Herald.

Companion Book for Kurt Cobain Documentary

Insight Editions will publish a companion book for the first authorized documentary about Kurt Cobain. Kurt Cobain: Montage of Heck will be released on April 7. Rolling Stone reports that the book features extended transcripts from the interviews conducted for this film, animation stills, rare pictures, and other personal items.

Frances Bean Cobain, the only child of the Nirvana frontman (pictured) and rocker Courtney Love, served as an executive producer for this project. The premiere screening will take place at the Sundance Film Festival; HBO will air it on May 4. Follow this link to watch the trailer.

via Insight Editions to Publish a Companion Book For the Kurt Cobain Documentary | GalleyCat.

Candlewick Takes “Evil Wizard” YA

Deborah Noyes at Candlewick Press took world English rights to Delia Sherman’s middle-grade novel The Evil Wizard Smallbone. Sherman won the Andre Norton Award—which honors outstanding YA and middle-grade science fiction and fantasy titles—in 2011 for The Freedom Maze (also published by Candlewick).

Evil Wizard, which Candlewick plans to publish in fall 2016, is set in coastal Maine and follows a boy who flees his abusive uncle to become, unwillingly, the apprentice of an evil wizard. Jill Grinberg, who has an eponymous agency, represented Sherman in the deal.

via Book Deals: Week of March 16, 2015.

Erik Larson and Lusitania Tragedy

Erik Larson, who’s made a career out of turning history into best sellers that read as urgently as thrillers, is sitting comfortably in his bright, quiet, luxurious apartment overlooking snow-covered Central Park.He jokes, a tad chillingly, that he’s “Hannibal Lecter — a literary Hannibal Lecter. “But there’s no need to check the pantry to see what (or who) might be in the freezer. A former journalist with a wry sense of humor, Larson simply isn’t sentimental about his subjects.

“There’s the good me and the bad me. The good me is, ‘Oh my God, this is horrible.’ The bad me is, “This is great, this is such a fabulous detail,’ ” he says.

via Erik Larson revisits the Lusitania tragedy.

Excerpt from Meyer’s “Winter”

Marissa Meyer finishes up her epic Sci-Fi take on familiar fairy tales with her new novel Winter. And that fruit on the cover strongly hints at what iconic character next gets the spotlight.

Winter, the stepdaughter of the evil Queen Levana who runs the moon colony of Luna, is at the heart of a tweaked version of the Snow White legend in the finale of Meyer’s Lunar Chronicles series. It goes on sale Nov. 10 from Macmillan. (Read an exclusive excerpt below.)

via Read an excerpt from Meyer’s ‘Winter’.