Jesse Kornbluth, author and cofounder of consumer book review website Bookreporter.com, died on April 3 in Manhattan following a battle with Lewy body dementia. He was 79.
Kornbluth began his career as a writer at Vanity Fair, the New York Times magazine, and New York magazine, among other outlets, and became known in the 1970s and ’80s as a prolific profiler of such subjects as Tom Cruise, Faye Dunaway, and Norah Ephron. But despite his background in glossy magazines, he was bullish on the possibilities of the internet—even for books.
In 1996, Kornbluth and former Condé Nast executive Carol Fitzgerald founded Bookreporter.com as an online consumer outlet and forum for book enthusiasts. The website, one of the first digital venues for books coverage, later grew into the Book Report Network, now comprising Bookreporter.com, its flagship editorial hub; ReadingGroupGuides.com, an online destination for reading groups; and Authors on the Web, a web design and consulting firm for authors. (
One year after launching Bookreporter.com, Kornbluth was hired as the editorial director of AOL, a role he held until 2002.)
“Jesse and I soldiered into a brand-new world, learning tech together (I have many funny stories about that) but, more than that, cementing a friendship that was one of the most important in my life,” Fitzgerald wrote in a tribute to Kornbluth in Bookreporter’s weekly newsletter. “Jesse was curious, kind, funny and brilliant. He made my writing better; he liked ‘snappy copy.’ He could shape copy in a nanosecond. He had a Rolodex of contacts that included some of the sharpest and most sought-after names in the business. People knew him and loved him.”
Kornbluth was also the author of seven books of nonfiction, such as the 1992 biography Highly Confident (Morrow), and two novels, including 2013’s Married Sex (Open Road), which PW called “astonishingly smart and sexy.” He also cowrote and ghostwrote a number of books, including titles by former Hearst CEO Frank A. Bennack Jr. and dancer and choreographer Twyla Tharp.
