Book Publishing Helps News Corp Beat Wall Street 3rd-Quarter Earnings Expectations

News Corp.'s net income fell in its fiscal third quarter, but its results beat Wall Street expectations due to better book publishing thanks to thriving sales of the "Divergent" series, which was launched as a movie in March.

The lift from books underlined News Corp.'s announcement last week that it would purchase romance fiction publisher Harlequin Enterprises for $415 million from Canada's Torstar Corp.

Chief Executive Robert Thomson told analysts on a conference call that there's "no doubt that book publishing is transitioning successfully to digital" and said Harlequin's