Tracking Amazon: The Rise of High-Priced E-books

Though the publishing world waits to see how e-book pricing will be affected in the long-run by the DoJ's ruling, the current climate of higher-priced e-books is perhaps being overlooked: six of the 10 Kindle bestsellers are priced $9.99 or higher.

Salman Rushdie Writes Thank You to Indie Booksellers

Salman Rushdie's memoir Joseph Anton comes out September 18, and this week he's written a Thank You letter to independent booksellers for their support during the fatwa following the publication of The Satanic Verses in 1989.

Authors on the Air September 17, 2012: Richard E. Dauch, Hendrick Smith

Richard E. Dauch, author of American Drive: How Manufacturing Will Save Our Country (St. Martin’s Press, 978-1-250-01082-7), will appear on Fox & Friends, Tuesday, September 18.

Hedrick Smith will be on Tavis Talks for Who Stole the American Dream? (Random House, 978-1400069668).

Tracking Amazon: 'Hunger Games' Dropped To $1.57

The movie tie-in paperback edition of The Hunger Games was reduced to $1.57 and immediately went from #20 to #2 on Amazon's bestseller list--enough to jump the Fifty Shades books but not enough to jump No Easy Day. The regular paperback edition, selling for $5.84, is ranked #19.

News Briefs: Week of September 17, 2012

July Bookstore Sales Rise and more

Two Dollar Radio Starts Nonfiction Journal

Eric Obenauf, the publisher and editor-in-chief of Two Dollar Radio, the indie press headquartered in Columbus, Ohio, wants the seven-year-old company to publish more nonfiction, but he doesn’t want to produce more than the five or six titles—primarily fiction—that the publisher currently releases each year. His solution, beginning this fall, is to launch Frequencies, a 100-page biannual journal that will be dedicated to nonfiction. Frequencies, like Two Dollar Radio’s books, is being distributed by Consortium and retails for $10 per issue. The first issue, just released, has an 1,800-copy print run.

A Book Guy Gets a Top Spot

When Hachette Book Group announced that Little, Brown publisher Michael Pietsch would succeed David Young next spring at the top perch of the publishing company, many were surprised. Surprised that Young was stepping down—he will be staying with the company, returning to his native England in a variety of roles including chairman of HBG—and, to an extent, surprised that Pietsch would be taking the corner office. A well-liked and successful figure in the industry, Pietsch has long been a top-tier editor, but in today’s publishing environment editorial success doesn’t often translate into the CEO’s chair. For many in the industry, seeing someone who’s worked directly with writers take the reins at a major house is refreshing.

Tantor Media Adds Print, Expands E-books

While a number of companies are retreating from print books, Tantor Media will begin using the format for the first time this fall and will also expand its e-book business.

Ballantine Bantam Dell Rejiggers Nonfiction Program

Ballantine Bantam Dell is creating a nonfiction team, which it says will complement its existing fiction team, which will be led by Jennifer Tung, who is joining RH from the women's magazine Redbook.

Tracking Amazon: Kindle Charts Not Affected by New DoJ Pricing

After HarperCollins announced this week that they've reached new agreements with e-tailers as part of the DoJ settlement, the top of the Kindle bestsellers chart still has lots of agency-priced books, with four frontlist e-books priced $12.99 and up landing in the top 10 as of September 13. The four titles were No Easy Day, A Wanted Man by Lee Child, Gone Girl, and Delusion in Death by J.D. Robb.

TOC Holds E-book Webcast

TOC will hold a webcast "Publishing's Remediators: A Conversation with ZolaBooks' CEO Joe Regal and Kat Meyer" on Wednesday, September 19 at 1 p.m. Pacific.

New Study: 55% of YA Books Bought by Adults

More than half the consumers of books classified for young adults aren’t all that young. According to a new study, fully 55% of buyers of works that publishers designate for kids aged 12 to 17 -- nicknamed YA books -- are 18 or older, with the largest segment aged 30 to 44, which alone accounted for 28% of YA sales. And adults aren’t just purchasing for others -- when asked about the intended recipient, they report that 78% of the time they are purchasing books for their own reading.

Tracking Amazon: HarperCollins Explores New E Prices

HarperCollins announced earlier this week that it had reached new sales terms with its e-tailers, and by September 13 nearly all HC e-books had been dropped to $9.99 across all platforms.

'No Easy Day' Sees Huge Sales, Topples 50 Shades

No Easy Day sold 253,000 copies in its first week on sale, according to Nielsen BookScan. The numbers were more than enough to place it at #1--it sold nearly three times as many copies as Fifty Shades of Grey, the #2 overall book with 86,000 copies sold.

Hachette Moves Toward E-Book Agreement

The 30-day window to reach new sales terms for e-books, given as part of the Department of Justice's settlement with HarperCollins, Hachette Book Group, and Simon & Schuster, has already seen HarperCollins reach new e-book agreements with its e-tailers. Now, Hachette has released a statement on the issue.

Pietsch Succeeding Young as CEO of HBG

Michael Pietsch is taking over at Hachette Book Group. The publisher announced today that Pietsch will be succeeding David Young as CEO of the U.S. division of the publisher.

Berkley Launching Graphic Novel Imprint, InkLit

Penguin's Berkley/NAL division is starting a graphic novel line called InkLit to be directed by Rich Johnson, co-founder of Yen Press and former v-p of trade book sales at DC Comics.

Tracking Amazon: Kindle Bestsellers Are Big Names & Low Prices

Unlike the bestselling print titles, which are almost exclusively big names, the bestselling Kindle titles are an even mix of bestselling names and low-priced titles.