BTW News Briefs

Penguin Random House will acquire the book publishing assets of F+W Media, beating out two other bidding companies. As a result, Random House’s Penguin Publishing Group division will publish all titles of F+W Books, which publishes 120 new titles annually and has more than 2,000 titles in backlist.

Harlequin announced the launch of Harlequin Studios, intending to increase the production of Harlequin-branded movie content, drawing on its list of 30,000 previously published titles for content. In its first action, Harlequin Studios will commission more than 20 films for Canada’s CTV Drama Channel.

Simon & Schuster will handle sales and distribution in the U.S. and Canada for Mrs Wordsmith starting September 1, and worldwide for Tanglewood Publishing starting October 1.

At Simon & Schuster, Doug Stambaugh has been promoted to vice president and director of strategic operations and business development, a newly created position. This change consolidates three different segments of S&S: business development, business operations, and new business models

Lisa Erickson has joined Harper Perennial and Harper paperbacks as marketing director.

Marisa Russell is joining Little, Brown Books for Young Readers as executive director of publicity, effective June 24. At Little, Brown, Erinn McGrath has been promoted to director of publicity and marketing, James Patterson; Elora Weil has been promoted to associate publicist.

On June 5 at a ceremony in New York City, the Community of Literary Magazines and Presses (CLMP) announced the winners of its fifth annual Firecracker Awards, given to honor the best self- and independently published books of fiction, creative nonfiction, and poetry and the best literary magazines in the categories of debut and general excellence.

John Edgar Wideman is the winner of the 2019 PEN/Malamud Award for Excellence in the Short Story, given in honor of the late Bernard Malamud in recognition of a body of work that demonstrates excellence in the art of short fiction.

Tayari Jones is the winner of the £30,000 2019 Women’s Prize for Fiction for An American Marriage (Algonquin Books).

The shortlists have been announced for the Orwell Prize for Political Fiction and the Orwell Prize for Political Writing (for nonfiction). Both awards recognize works that “strive to meet Orwell’s own ambition ‘to make political writing into an art.’”

Share your news in BTW News Briefs! Publishers and industry partners are welcome to e-mail [email protected] with news about awards, imprint launches, distribution changes, staff promotions, and more.