TODAY'S NEWS

Sales Fall at B&N; Lowers Sales Outlook
Jim Milliot
Total sales declined 2% at Barnes & Noble in the second quarter ended August 2, falling to $1.22 billion. Store sales were off 1.6%, to $1.1 billion, while sales through Barnes & Noble.com increased 3.6% to $99.8 million. Comparable store sales fell 4.7% at the physical stores in the period. The sales declines were expected since last July B&N posted record results because of the release of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. However, B&N said that even excluding Hallows, comp sales were still down 1.5%. Furthermore, the nation’s largest bookseller said that given results in the first half and current trends, it was reducing its comparable sales outlook for the full year, lowering its prediction from slightly negative to a comp decrease in low single digits. Comp sales in the third quarter are expected to decline in the low single digits as well. Read on »

Terry Goodkind Hits the Kindle
By Rachel Deahl
In an exclusive deal with Kindle, Terry Goodkind's first novel, Wizard's First Rule, was released this week as a RosettaBooks e-book, available for purchase on the Amazon device only. Goodkind, who is published by Tor, has held onto his digital rights up until now; Rule, first released in print in 1994, marks the first of Goodkind's titles to appear in e-book.

Arthur Klebanoff, CEO of RosettaBooks, said the fact that Goodkind's work has never been published in e-book format is less surprising than one might assume. "A range of 'A' list commercial authors--Dean Koontz until recently, J.K. Rowling--have either held back or frozen their e-book rights," he said. Now, with the growing popularity of digital reading devices like the Kindle, Klebanoff thinks industry players are seeing, for the first time, the market viability of e-books. "Slowly but surely Kindle, Sony Reader and other [devices] are convincing publishers, and publishers are in turn convincing their bestselling authors, to release e-books." Read on »

Hollywood Still Going After Fitzgerald
By Rachel Deahl
Both as a screenwriter and an author, F. Scott Fitzgerald never quite found his place in Hollywood. Although the myriad screenplays he wrote met the same disappointing box office fate as the handful of films adapted from his fiction, the hope that there's a winning movie in his work lives on. In December, audiences will see Brad Pitt and Cate Winslett appear in the David Fincher-helmed adaptation of the author's little-known short story, "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button." And, with Hollywood options on several other Fitzgerald properties, there may soon be a swell of material about, and by, the romantic and doomed Jazz Age writer.

Don Laventhall at Harold Ober, which oversees the Fitzgerald estate, recently renegotiated the option that Fox has on Tender is the Night. He told PW that the deal was in the "healthy six figures." Fitzgerald's The Pat Hobby Stories is also under option, as are Zelda Fitzgerald's life rights. Laventhal also expects to close a deal after Labor Day on another Fitzgerald short story, which he declined to name. Read on »

The PW Morning Report
By Dermot McEvoy
Robert Kuttner Gives His Side of the Controversy; Boehlert: How Obama Nation and Fox News Struck-Out; Penguin U.K. Plays the Dating Game; Zyzzyva Is 23; Brigitte Gabriel’s Q&A; and Growing Up at Grossinger’s Back In Print Read on »

Blogs

AUTHORS ON THE AIR

Authors on the Air: 'Scuse Me While I Kiss the Sky, Updated; Paul Auster; You Lost Him at Hello
Yesterday on NPR’s Soundcheck, David Henderson discussed his newly revised, updated and expanded edition of 'Scuse Me While I Kiss the Sky: Jimi Hendrix: Voodoo Child (Atria, $26.95), originally published in 1978. Read on »

PICTURE OF THE DAY

On the Run Again
Marathoner and author Dean Karnazes, who ran 50 marathons in 50 states in 50 days, recently stopped by the Santa Barbara, Calif., Borders to sign copies of his new book, 50/50 (Wellness Central). Karnazes (r.) is pictured here with fan Rick Perez, and Perez’s sons Matthew (5) and Noah (8).
Photo credit: Kate Schwab Submit your pictures here »

JOB OF THE DAY

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