Milkweed Editions announced Wednesday that Janna “J” Rademacher has been hired as the nonprofit literary press’s managing director. Rademacher, a freelance book publicist for the past three years, whose clients included Bellevue Literary Press, Haymarket Books, and Copper Canyon, previously served for 15 years as marketing director at Graywolf Press from 1992-2007. She was also managing director there for the last 10 of those years and worked closely with Graywolf publisher Fiona McCrae in coordinating the nonprofit literary press’s successful two-year $1 million fundraising campaign. Rademacher will be responsible for sales, marketing, publicity and finance at Milkweed, which has eight employees.
The position of managing director had been eliminated at Milkweed two years ago, when Hilary Reeves, who held that position for five years, left the press to pursue other interests. Rademacher will report to publisher and CEO Daniel Slager. She will assume her new duties on a part-time basis immediately, as she completes previous freelance commitments. Rademacher will assume the position full-time Sept. 1.
Rademacher’s hire was prompted by the recent departure of Milkweed’s marketing & publicity manager for the past two years, Jessica Deutsch, who is moving to Coffee House Press as of Aug. 1. Deutsch will replace Molly Mikolowski as marketing director. Mikolowski, who had joined Coffee House in 1999 and served as the press’s marketing director since 2002, recently left there to launch her own book marketing and publicity company, A Literary Light. She can be reached at molly.mikolowski@gmail.com.
