TODAY'S NEWS

BAM Picks Brownstone Books
By Felicia Pride
Beginning this month, Brownstone Books, an African-American oriented bookstore located in Brooklyn, will take over the Brooklyn Academy of Music's bookstore, which was previously handled by Manhattan-based Shakespeare & Co.

Crystal Bobb-Semple, who opened Brownstone Books with her husband in 2000, said that BAM approached Brownstone to take over their store because it was looking to partner with a local Brooklyn bookseller. Bobb-Semple, who created Brownstone to be a gathering point in the Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood added, "We both share the goal of creating community around the arts." Read on »

Penguin Canada Shuffles Canadian Publishing Division
By Josh Kerbel
Fresh off its C$100-million year in 2007, the first in its 30-year history, David Davidar, president and publisher of Penguin Group Canada, announced a restructuring of the company. "It is with regret that I announce the departure of Barbara Berson from Penguin Group Canada as a result of the restructuring of the division," said Davidar. "Barbara has been a long-time member of the editorial department and will be missed." Nicole Winstanley, executive editor in charge of fiction, takes responsibility for Berson's authors, in addition to assuming charge of children's publishing. Additional changes at the publisher include the redistribution of responsibilities among editorial directors Andrea Magyar and Diane Turbide and senior editor Helen Reeves. Penguin plans to recruit a new editor to focus specifically on commercial fiction--crime, thrillers, romance, fantasy and historical novels.

This marks the second announced restructuring in the Canadian publishing industry for 2008, with Raincoat Books announcing that it will close its Canadian publishing operations after the spring 2008 season.

iUniverse to Move to Bloomington
By Rachel Deahl
iUniverse parent company, Author Solutions, is relocating the vanity press from its Lincoln, Neb., offices to Bloomington, Ind. Author Solutions, headquartered in Bloomington, acquired iUniverse in September and delivered the news to the 70 employees on staff in Lincoln earlier this week.

Kevin Weiss, CEO of Author Solutions, said all employees have been offered jobs in Bloomington. Weiss said the decision to relocate iUniverse was made in order to consolidate operations in Bloomington. While it is unclear how many of those 70 iUniverse staffers will take the relocation package, a number of key executives, including iUniverse president Susan Driscoll, are going to Bloomington.

Knopf to Release Latest Huffington in April
By Dermot McEvoy
Founder of HuffingtonPost.com, Arianna Huffington, has a new book on the way that excoriates the media, Bob Woodward and Tim Russert in particular.

Knopf will publish Right Is Wrong: How the Lunatic Fringe Hijacked America, Shredded the Constitution, and Made Us All Less Safe April 29. Huffington, whose previous books include On Becoming Fearless, Pigs at the Trough and Maria Callas, particularly targets Bob Woodward of the Washington Post and Tim Russert, moderator of Meet the Press, as moderators of the Republican agenda, according to a Knopf release. Read on »

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MORE STORIES

PubWest Sets Conference for Nov 13-15
The Publishers Association of the West has announced the dates for its National Publishing Conference on and industry trade show: November 13-15. The show, which will take place in Portland, Ore., will follow-up on the 2007 "Digital World" conference focusing on how industry members and organizations can use technology to their advantage.

Proposals from industry members for speakers and topics are welcome. Those interested in submitting must do should go to www.pubwest.org; submissions must arrive by March 14. For additional information, or questions, executive director Kent Watson can also be contacted at kent@pubwest.org.

Job Moves
At Houghton Mifflin Lori Glazer has been promoted. Glazer has been bumped up from v-p and executive director of publicity for Houghton Mifflin to v-p and executive director for Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, Trade & Reference. Glazer has been at the publisher for 17 years.

David Hahn, senior v-p of Ruder Finn's Planned Television Arts (PTA) division, has been named managing director of the division and promoted to executive v-p. PTA is the largest book publicity firm in the country and Hahn will be expanding its reach in Internet marketing with a division called PTA Interactive. The firm will also be opening new offices in Chicago and San Francisco. Hahn is replacing Rick Frishman, who will stay on as senior counsel.

Mondays Reviews Today: Lahiri's 'Earth' & Judt's 'Reappraisals'
In Jhumpa Lahiri's "stunning" new collection of short stories, Unaccustomed Earth, the author turns to familiar territory, dissecting "the gulf that separates expatriate Bengali parents from their American-raised children." With stories that "evince a spare and subtle mastery," Lahiri proves, again, a master of the form and an author with "few contemporary equals." And in Tony Judt's collection of previously published essays, Reappraisals: Reflections on the Forgotten Twentieth Century, the author offers up a "fascinating exploration of the world we have recently lost" that "cannot be bested." Read on »

AUTHORS ON THE AIR

Authors on the Air: Ukra's Ultimate Tea Diet; Scieszka's Smash! Crash!; McGinn's House Lust
Authors on the Air: Ukra's Ultimate Tea Diet; Scieszka's Smash! Crash!; McGinn's House Lust Read on »

PICTURE OF THE DAY

Dukakis Does Brecht
Actress Olympia Dukakis was at the Lincoln Center Barnes & Noble in Manhattan earlier this month to do a theatrical reading of Bertolt Brecht's Mother Courage and Her Children. The reading was part of a Penguin Classics event as the publisher recently reissued the play. Dukakis (pictured here) has appeared in multiple performances of the play and contributed the book's foreword.
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JOB OF THE DAY

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