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Simon Schuster Penguin Random House, Words of 2020, and Romancing the Runoff

by | Nov 27, 2020 | Publishing News | 1 comment

Happy Friday, everyone! And to our American friends, Happy Thanksgiving! We hope you’ve been able to spend quality time with those you love, whether in person or virtually, and are completely stuffed full of delicious food. I for one am envious of any pumpkin pie that has been consumed (even though we already had our Thanksgiving up here in Canada). At KWL, we wrapped up the submissions for our cover contest this week – thank you to everyone who submitted their titles! Stay tuned for the first round of voting next week!

Starting off the roundup with some KWL news: we had a great takeover event with Dale Roberts this week! You can check it out here:

Definitely the biggest publishing news this week: Penguin Random House is set to buy Simon and Schuster for a cool $2 billion.

ViacomCBS sells Simon & Schuster to Penguin Random House for $2 billion

ViacomCBS announced Wednesday that it would sell publishing company Simon & Schuster to Penguin Random House, a subsidiary of Bertelsmann, in a deal worth nearly $2.18 billion The transaction is expected to close in 2021. The deal comes after ViacomCBS put the global publisher up for auction, a move it made to divest noncore assets from its company.

Simon and Schuster Children’s Publishing will be launching two graphic novel lines for young readers.

S&S to Launch Two Graphic Novel Lines for Young Readers

Simon & Schuster Children’s Publishing will introduce two new graphic novel lines aimed at emerging readers next year: Little Simon Graphic Novels, created for readers ages five to nine, will roll out in February 2021 under the Little Simon chapter-book imprint, and Ready-to-Read Graphics will debut next summer with graphic novels for the same audience as its Ready-to-Read leveled readers.

Penguin Random House Canada announced their plan to publish another Jordan Peterson book this week, which was met with resistance from its staff.

Staff at Jordan Peterson’s publisher protest new book plans

The announcement of a new book from Canadian psychologist Jordan Peterson, the self-styled “professor against political correctness”, has prompted dozens of complaints from staff at his publisher in Canada, according to a report.

After receiving an open letter from authors and publishers, Audible has changed course on its return policy.

Audible bows to pressure and changes returns policy

Audible has announced an alteration to its returns policy, following an open letter signed by over 10,000 authors and industry representatives calling for it to make changes. From 1st January 2021, the company will pay royalties to authors for any title returned more than seven days following purchase.

The Oxford English Dictionary has announced their words of 2020.

Pandemic, lockdown and Megxit: the most influential words of 2020

How do we get new words and how do old words get a fresh twist? In normal times, it’s a well-worn process, linguistic business as usual. There will be a new invention or thing to buy, such as “wifi” (1999) or an “iPod” (2001).

And this interview on the CBC gives insight as to how to the words were chosen.

https://www.cbc.ca/radio/asithappens/as-it-happens-monday-edition-1.5810687/oed-names-words-plural-for-2020-to-mark-an-unprecedented-year-1.5813141

Romance authors and their readers raised almost $400,000 to help the Democratic candidates in the senate run-off races in Georgia.

Romance authors and readers raised almost $400,000 to help Stacey Abrams turn Georgia blue

The romance community is looking to give Democrats a happily-ever-after in Georgia. With the auction Romancing the Runoff, which was organized by authors Alyssa Cole, Courtney Milan, and Kit Rocha (the pseudonym of writing duo Donna Herren and Bree Bridges), the community of authors and readers raised nearly $400,000 in the last week.

Twenty-five years worth of Alan Rickman’s diaries are going to be published as a book in 2022.

Alan Rickman’s Diaries Will be Published as a Book in 2022

The diaries of the late actor Alan Rickman – best known for playing Severus Snape in the ” Harry Potter ” movies – will be published as a book in fall 2022. As reported by The Guardian, Rickman’s journals covered everything from his thoughts on acting to insights on friendships and politics.

And finally, if you’re looking to add even more books to your TBR pile, or need inspiration for some holiday shopping, Time Magazine has announced their list of must read books of 2020.

https://time.com/collection/must-read-books-2020/

Have a wonderful weekend!

1 Comment

  1. bpsaraswati
    bpsaraswati on November 27, 2020 at 9:58 PM

    Happy Friday to you and your family 👪

    Reply

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