News

Surviving the Angel of Death

Thank you for all the letters, emails and bricks that have winged my way since I sacked my assistant manager, Onion, last month. The bricks... Read more

DK to lose 44 staff in restructure

Penguin subsidiary Dorling Kindersley is to undergo a "radical" restructure with the loss of 44 jobs. The news was announced to staff by Penguin this... Read more

Profits plummet at Penguin

Penguin saw a decline of 24% in adjusted operating profit last year, with a weak US consumer market and problems with distribution contributing to the... Read more

Brown and the Book Club grow the market

Tom Holman writesAs Dan Brown's success rolls relentlessly on, evidence mounts that Transworld's star novelist is growing the whole market for books. The Da Vinci... Read more

High tide for Italian trade

Herbert LottmanThe acqua alta rose only to ankle level during the Venice session of the Mauri Foundation booksellers school, but your correspondent managed to immerse... Read more

WHS refuses to budge on fines

W H Smith has refused to back down over the imposition of charges for late or partial book deliveries.The chain was this week in talks... Read more

London libraries fail stock test

A straw poll of public libraries in London, conducted by The Bookseller, has shown the drought of recent bestselling books available on library shelves.Of a... Read more

Bond to lead HC literary arm

Alison Bone HarperCollins UK is to split out its literary publishing arm, placing it on a par with its General Books and Collins divisions.The move... Read more

Hachette creates new children's force

Alison BoneWatts Publishing and Hodder Children's Books are to merge as part of Hachette Livre's review of its UK operations, creating a £30m business with... Read more

BBC plans adult literacy push

The BBC is to launch a three to five-year literacy campaign in October, targeting 12 million emergent readers aged between 25 and 54.Called RaW (Reading... Read more

Tesco weighs in for WBD

Fiona FraserNearly 700 Tesco stores will take part in this year's World Book Day activities, on top of a record 1,700 bookshops registered for the... Read more

End in sight for print journals, Reed says

Reed Elsevier c.e.o. Crispin Davis has forecast an end to print journal publishing after seeing online business at the STM giant rocket.The group's electronic sales... Read more

Phaidon Press ventures into children's books

Phaidon Press is to launch a new children's list this summer, in its first move into the children's market.Publisher Amanda Renshaw said that Phaidon's children's... Read more

The Book People prices up for profit

Fiona FraserThe Book People is to improve its profitability by aligning its selling prices more closely with those on the high street this year. The... Read more

Local books for local people

I was very interested to read of the success of local history books from a bookseller's perspective in Richard Barker's stimulating article "Tesco's better in... Read more