TODAY'S NEWS

Bookstore Sales Up in January

Despite some soft sales reports from the chains, bookstore sales got off to a solid start in 2008, posting a 4.7% increase, to $2.28 billion, in January, according to preliminary estimates from the U.S. Census Bureau. The increase was nearly the same as gains for the entire retail segment, which had a 4.8% increase in January. Read on »

Roy Schonfeld Named PW's Rep of the Year
by Kevin Howell
Roy Schonfeld, from Abraham Associates, Inc., has been named Publishers Weekly’s Sales Rep of the Year.   Read On »

Salon du Livres Opens Amid Controversy
Rüdiger Wischenbart
The Salon du Livre, the hugely popular book exhibition and festival in Paris, opened last night after enduring weeks of controversy from Arab publishers and writers about its decision to name Israel as its guest of honor.  The Egytian bestselling author Alaa Al Aswani has denounced Israel as a "country responsible for crimes against humanity," but Al Aswani will nevertheless attend Salon to promote his new book, Chicago – while planning to distribute pictures of Palestinian and Lebanese children who became victims of Israeli politics.  And a number of Arab countries, including Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia and Lebanon, are boycotting the show. Read on »

Regnery Wins Arbitration Ruling
By Rachel Deahl
Ending its second recent legal scuffle with an author, Regnery has had another successful round. The publisher received a favorable ruling in a March 10 arbitration decision that calls for author Richard Miniter to repay nearly $150,000. Regnery was awarded the ruling after claiming Miniter, who wrote the 2005 book Disinformation for the house, did not live up to his two book contract and, instead, took a second work to Simon & Schuster. This is not the only legal matter Miniter and Regnery are in, though. Miniter also filed a suit (with four other Regnery authors) for what he claims are withheld profits on transactions through non-retail channels like book clubs and charity giveaways. Regnery won the first round in that case, which was dismissed with prejudice in January. Despite that ruling, and Monday's decision, Miniter is continuing to fight. He said the case with the other authors is headed to arbitration, and that he plans to overturn this latest ruling. Read on »

Poems to Go
By Craig Morgan Teicher
The Academy of America Poets, one of the major nonprofits devoted to poetry and the organization that created National Poetry Month, has adapted its Web site for use on the iPhone and other mobile devices, according to Robin Beth Schaer, chief online coordinator. The Academy's site, poets.org, features an expansive online archive of poems tagged by theme, essays about poetry, links to poetry related resources and other related content, and is a popular tool for finding poems to read at occasions, such as weddings and funerals. Using Web 2.0 standards as well as Apple's Developer's Guidelines, the Academy has added a new section to its site—poets.org/m—that refits and optimizes its content for mobile devices.  Read on »

Blogs

EXTRA STORIES

ESPN Movie Helps U. of Arkansas Basketball Book
The University of Arkansas is hoping that Black Magic, a four-hour ESPN film about basketball at historically black colleges during the civil rights movement  set to air March 16-17 will give a boost to its book on the same subject, Breaking Through: John B. McLendon, Basketball Legend and Civil Rights Pioneer. U. of Arkansas is now into its second printing of Breaking Through, which first went on sale in September 2007, and is anticipating heavy interest as NCAA March Madness heats up. Read on »

The PW Morning Report: A daily round-up of the latest publishing news
Spitzer Book Deal?; Peres Opens Paris Book Fair; Terry Pratchett Donates $500,000; Adam Bellow to Collins; Freedom Writer for the Defense; Yates to Direct Harry; E-Books Hit U.K.; and New Book for Tiki Read on »

Monday's Reviews Today: An Office Mystery & The Pension Crunch
In Ed Park's "cubicle cozy," Personal Days, a bunch of Manhattan office drones watch as their company starts to downsize. The layoffs become a tense game of last man standing and Park, a former literary editor at the Village Voice and founder of the Believer, "has built the tension masterfully." Touching on a topic many Americans have on the mind, is Roger Lowenstein's While America Aged: How Pension Debts Ruined General Motors, Stopped the New York Subways, Bankrupted San Diego, and Loom as the Next Financial Crisis. Lowenstein tackles the subject with a "refreshing perspective" in a book that "gives the reader lively stories and historical insight." Read on »

AUTHORS ON THE AIR

Authors on the Air: Dandy in the Underworld; Sadie Jones; John Adams on HBO
This morning on All Things Considered, British artist Sebastian Horsley introduced Dandy in the Underworld: An Unauthorized Autobiography (HarperPerennial, $13.95). PW's review had this to say: "Pithy and engaging, Horsley bares all, painting himself as a misogynist, a sexual deviant and a narcissist." Read on »

PICTURE OF THE DAY

HC Children's Gets Posey In NYC
On Wednesday HarperCollins Children's Books president Susan Katz (l.) joined actresses Parker Posey (r.) and Lauren Ambrose, stars of the upcoming Fox series The Return of Jezebel James, for storytime at the New York Public Library. The actresses read two books--Kevin Henkes' A Good Day and John Grogan's Bad Dog, Marley!--and the event ties nicely into Posey's turn in the new sitcom; she plays a HarperCollins Children's Books editor with her own imprint. Read on »

JOB OF THE DAY

PW VIRTUAL EDITION