Crown

Pearson, the British media conglomerate, said Thursday that it was in talks to combine its Penguin publishing house with Random House, owned by Bertelsmann of Germany.

The deal, if completed, would bring together two of the biggest book publishers in the world, uniting Penguin and its iconic orange logo with the owner of Crown Publishing and Knopf Doubleday. The combination would create a division with greater scale that could compete in a rapidly evolving e-book market.

The Random House Foundation, Inc., currently home to the Random House Creative Writing Competition, announces the Random House Teacher Awards. Funded by the Random House Foundation, Inc., the awards will recognize the nation’s most dynamic and resourceful teachers who use their creativity to inspire and successfully instill a love of reading in students. These teachers will be awarded grants to help make their innovative reading programs possible.

Goodreads Community Manager Patrick Brown calls the site “the largest in the world for readers and book recommenders,” soon to hit nine million members. He says discovery is their most important role, and reviews are the cornerstone of how the site supports discovery. According to Brown, Goodreads' reviews spread beyond the site and they are the number one driver of book reviews to Facebook.

Scholastic (SCHL), the global children's publishing, education and media company, announced today that Jenny Frost has joined the company as Senior Vice President, E-Publisher and E-Book Strategy for the company's E-Commerce Group.  Ms. Frost will be responsible for selecting, presenting and marketing digital product which will be sold to teacher and parent customers who access e-books from Scholastic and other publishers through Scholastic's e-commerce vehicles including Storia™, the company's e-reading application.

LID Publishing, Inc. announced as part of their growth plans in the US, Karl Weber has taken on the position as Editorial Board Chairperson.  In his new role, he will oversee the quality and content of the company¹s publications. Mr. Weber will advise on titles for LID¹s publication plans, help with the strategy and development of the company in the US, and work with other board members to achieve the successful progress of the company within the business sector.

Zondervan has announced a collaboration between Nobel Peace Prize Winner, Archbishop Desmond Tutu and New York Times best-selling author and illustrator, Nancy Tillman. The pair has signed on to create a unique picture book based on the creation story from Tutu's highly successful Children of God Storybook Bible.

The picture book will feature Nancy Tillman's whimsical and imaginative illustrations bringing to life Archbishop Tutu's heartwarming narration about God's wonderful creation. Zondervan holds world rights to the project and plans to release the premium picture book in Spring 2014.

You can’t spend three days at a conference such as the recent Tools of Change (February 13-15) and not marvel at the logistics, atmospherics and the countless insights and discoveries sprinkled throughout the event.

The location at the Times Square Marriott provided a striking reminder of the new power of electronic media in lights and motion. The glittering mash up of news crawls, jumbo video screens, advertising and entertainment that now define the Manhattan theater district, and Broadway and 42nd Street has become an urban theme park.

Mike Shatzkin has another fascinating essay over at The Shatzkin Files. Here he goes into detail about how e-books are priced by various actors in the e-book publishing industry. He explains that the break between agency pricing and non-agency pricing creates two separate standards—the “digital retail price” (of which agency vendors take 30 percent and are not allowed to change) …

Happy Thanksgiving, Book Business readers!

May we recommend you check out (but don't gore yourself on)the year's 100 notable tomes in fiction, poetry and nonfiction as selected by the New York Times between drumsticks, football games and "quality time" with extended family. Remember, it's about portion control, people.

In a time of significant flux in the industry, publishing executives are faced with more pressure than ever to examine their businesses and make decisions that will lead them to a profitable future. Book Business checked in with the leaders of publishing companies of various sizes and scopes—from Scholastic to Springer to Merriam-Webster to Triple Crown—to find out what their best business decisions of the year have been.