Scholastic Partners With Sourcebooks, Builds Foundation for Forthcoming E-reading App

Children's publishing and media giant Scholastic has entered into a partnership with independent publisher Sourcebooks, which will soon offer its children's titles through Scholastic's distribution channels, including, most notably, the new Scholastic e-reading app to be launched this fall. The app, which is "specially designed to captivate kids while helping them become better readers," according to a company press release, will offer both front list and backlist Sourcebooks titles as a result of the agreement. Picture books, elementary series, middle-grade chapter books and young adult novels will be available for download to the new e-reading app through Scholastic Book Clubs.

"Scholastic is leading the way in creating a true interactive digital reading experience for children that adds excitement about reading with special features that can only be offered in an electronic format," said Dominique Raccah, CEO and Publisher of Sourcebooks, in the press release. "The partnership between Scholastic and educators has been a strong catalyst in inspiring new generations of book lovers, and we are thrilled to be a part of this effort to provide teachers and parents with an incredible new tool to meet kids where they are on the electronic devices they love and make reading even more fun."

The first Sourcebooks titles to be offered through the new Scholastic app will be Francesca Simon's bestselling "Horrid Henry" series, Kristi Yamaguchi's "Dream Big, Little Pig," and Laura Duksta's picture book "I Love You More."

Judy Newman, executive vice president of Scholastic and president of Scholastic Book Clubs and e-Commerce, stated in the press release, "Sourcebooks is an ideal partner for the new Scholastic e-reading application because of the wide array of best-selling titles they offer. We also share a mission of reaching as many young people as possible with books that will enrich and inform their lives. For years we have loved offering Sourcebooks titles through Scholastic Book Clubs, and we're excited to be able to offer these treasured titles in an electronic format to encourage even more kids to read every day."

Last week, Scholastic announced a new partnership with independent digital publisher Ruckus Media Group, through which many e-books will be offered under the brand Scholastic Ruckus. Scholastic also has partnerships with several other publishers in the works, which will allow more titles to be offered when the company's e-reading application is launched this fall.