TODAY'S NEWS

B&N.com Settles with California for $9 Million
by Jim Milliot
Barnes & Noble.com’s long running dispute with the California Board of Equalization has finally been settled with B&N.com paying $9 million to the state. The case stems from the BOE’s attempt to collect what it said were back taxes, plus penalties and interest, from B&N.com for its failure to collect California sales tax from November 1999 through March 14, 2004. The settlement ends two related complaints; one involving an assessment for $700,000 for uncollected taxes between November 15, 1999 and January 31, 2000 and a second assessment totaling $17.0 million for May 1, 2000 through March 31, 2004. The BOE was challenging an appeals court decision that overturned a previous ruling that B&N.com owed $700,000, while B&N.com had filed a complaint looking to overturn the $17 million assessment. Under the agreement, the BOE canceled both assessments and all pending litigation was dropped. The agreement was signed by both parties last month. B&N.com began collecting California sales tax on November 1, 2005. Read on »

Authors Mix Well with Business at PNBA
by Wendy Werris
Sharply divided opinions about IndieBound and a first-time experiment with a schedule change for Pacific Northwest Booksellers Association’s 2008 trade show that gave publishers and reps the option of exhibiting for either one or two days created a lively, successful atmosphere at this year’s first regional event, held in Portland, Oregon at the Holiday Inn.

Although about half of the publishers only stayed for one day, they had ample time to see and take orders from a healthy crowd of booksellers at a show that saw its attendance climb back up to where it had been two years ago, the last time it was held in Portland. “We were in a 35,000 square foot conference center last year that was really too big for our purposes,” said PNBA Executive Director Thom Chambliss. “Everyone seems to prefer this hall (at the Holiday Inn). At 15,000 square feet it’s cozier and it’s cheaper, which is more meaningful to our members than ever before.” Read on »

Meg Cabot to Donate Proceeds from Book to Greenpeace
By Lynn Andriani
Bestselling chick lit author Meg Cabot announced that she will donate her worldwide proceeds (advances and royalties) for her next book, Ransom My Heart, to Greenpeace. Avon A will release the book, which is part of Cabot’s bestselling Princess Diaries series, on January 6, 2009. The book is actually authored by the series' heroine, Her Royal Highness, The Princess Mia Thermopolis, who Cabot says has always been an outspoken animal rights activist and committed environmentalist. “Though Mia will not, as she once dreamed, be spending her gap year working for Greenpeace manning a rubber dinghy, keeping whales from getting harpooned, income generated from this book will help someone else do so,” said Cabot.

Avon A will print Ransom My Heart on 55#/416ppi Enviro100 Book, which contains 100% post-consumer fibers, created by FSC-certified Cascade Mill in Quebec.

Phoenix Signs Christie Bio
With interest in Agatha Christie back in the publishing news following the announcement that 13 and-a-half hours of previously unknown tape recordings of Christie have been uncovered, Phoenix Books has acquired a biography on the mystery maven from bestselling author Richard Hack. Michael Viner and Henrietta Tiefenthaler of Phoenix acquired world rights to Hack’s The Duchess of Death. The biography will draw on more than 5,000 previously unpublished letters, notes and documents, and a June 2009 pub date is planned. Hack has written several previous biographies, including Hughes: The Private Diaries, Letters, and Memos, which was a bestseller.

Page to Screen: Dracula for Kiddies & A New Cox
By Rachel Deahl
This week Brendan Deneen at Objective reports he's "close to a deal" on the YA graphic novel Dear Dracula. Written by Joshua Williamson and illustrated by Vicente Navarrete, the book is about a boy who, instead of sending his Christmas wish to Santa, pens Dracula asking to become an actual vampire for Halloween. Deneen is pitching the book, which is due from Image on October 29, as a "franchise-level movie in the spirit of Goonies." There's one offer in on the book, which Deneed said is in to production companies and more than one studio.

Rob Kraitt at AP Watt has just started shopping film rights on a few titles to U.K. producers, among them Michael Cox's new one, The Glass of Time. Cox's 2006 debut, The Meaning of Night, bowed to strong reviews and Glass, out in the U.S. from Norton in October, again garnered a starred review from PW. Kraitt has meetings planned with U.S. producers and scouts late next month.

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AUTHORS ON THE AIR

Authors on the Air: Willie Nelson; The Migraine Brain; Danny Goldberg
This morning on The Early Show, country music legend Willie Nelson, co-author (with Mike Blakely) of the novel A Tale Out of Luck (Center Street, $21.99). PW said “while rookie novelist Nelson and veteran Blakely write convincingly of the Old West, the plotting is cumbersome, the characters familiar and the dialogue strained. Nelson's legions of fans probably won't mind, though.” Read on »

PICTURE OF THE DAY

PNBA Hits Portland
Pictured here at the PNBA show in Portland, Ore., are: Thom Chambliss, PNBA's executive director; Leigh Ann Giles, Western AS Bookstore; Alison Web, Eagle Harbor Books; George Carroll, independent rep; Jan Healy, Eagle Harbor Books. Submit your pictures here »

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