Random House | The New York Observer

Notes for Andy Ward, on the Eve of His Move to Random House

Tue, 18 Aug 2009 19:28:36 -0400

Random House surprised the publishing industry Monday with the hiring of GQ executive editor Andy Ward, who will be joining the editorial staff of the house’s flagship imprint in mid-September. Though Mr. Ward began his career in letters as an editorial assistant at Little, Brown, he has spent the past 13 years working in magazines—the most recent six at GQ, and the seven before that at Esquire. Mr. Ward is just one of several...

Random House Hires GQ Editor Andy Ward

Mon, 17 Aug 2009 14:59:00 -0400

Random House just announced the hiring of Andy Ward, a longtime magazine editor who has spent the past six years at GQ. Mr. Ward, who will serve as an executive editor at Random House's flagship imprint under editor-in-chief Susan Kamil, leaves behind Condé Nast at a time when the company is playing host to a team of consultants from McKinsey who are scrutinizing its operations and figuring out what costs can be cut and...

Three Cups of Tea Authors Mortenson and Relin Part Ways; Latter Sells Next Book to Random House

Thu, 13 Aug 2009 10:56:00 -0400

David Oliver Relin, the journalist who co-wrote the 2006 bestseller Three Cups of Tea with mountain-climber-turned-humanitarian Greg Mortenson, has left Viking Penguin and signed with Random House for his next book. Tentatively titled See How They Shine, Mr. Relin’s book will follow two doctors on a mission around the world to cure blindness. Susan Kamil, the editor in chief of Random’s flagship imprint, preempted world rights to the book from Jin Auh at the...

Random House Pays North of $1 Million For Oren's Book on Israel, But Ambassadorship Means They Have to Wait

Thu, 25 Jun 2009 13:25:16 -0400

The historian Michael Oren didn’t know he would soon become Israel’s new ambassador to the United States when he and his literary agent at ICM, Jennifer Joel, started working on the proposal for his new book earlier this year. The book, according to editors who saw the proposal when Ms. Joel sent it out in early April, would tell the story of Israel’s founding. The project drew a lot of interest, thanks in part...

Times' Nick Bilton Takes a Byte Out of Books

Thu, 25 Jun 2009 09:01:27 -0400

A couple of weeks ago, Nick Bilton went on leave as the New York Times' user interface specialist and design integration editor to start writing his book, Byte. Snack. Meal: The New Business of Storytelling, due out from Crown in June 2010.

"It was a touchy subject," he said. "The Times is having a tough time and for me to go off and do this book, it took...

Novel About Hemingway Sold to 'Loving Frank' Editor For North of Half a Million

Wed, 17 Jun 2009 12:20:55 -0400

On Monday, we reported that literary agent Julie Barer was out with a historical novel by Paula McLain written from the perspective of Ernest Hemingway’s first wife, Hadley Richardson. At the time, Ms. Barer was preparing to take the book to auction, and expected to have a winner by the end of the day. Quitting time came and went, though, and, due to the intense interest the book inspired from editors, the auction was...

TNR's Noam Scheiber Ditches One Book Project, Signs With Simon & Schuster For Another

Thu, 21 May 2009 14:33:56 -0400

Noam Scheiber, the columnist and senior editor at The New Republic, is writing a book about the Obama administration’s handling of the economic crisis. It will be published by the flagship imprint of Simon & Schuster and overseen by editor in chief Priscilla Painton, who acquired the book at auction last month. According to Ms. Painton, the book will take as its subject the key players in the new administration’s economic agenda, including Timothy...

After Months of Negotiations, Steve Rubin Becomes 'Publisher At Large' at Random House

Thu, 12 Feb 2009 11:24:45 -0500

When Markus Dohle announced the restructuring of Random House back in December, one knot left untied was the fate of Steve Rubin, who had been with the company, in one capacity or another, for more than 20 years. His most recent job there, as president and publisher of the Doubleday Broadway Group, was eliminated as part of the restructuring, and for a second there it looked like another one of the industry's most visible...

Random House Prevails in Battle for Diane Keaton's Memoir

Mon, 09 Feb 2009 11:44:18 -0500

A long competition over Diane Keaton’s memoir, which compelled some of New York’s busiest editors and publishers to clear their schedules last week and fly to Los Angeles to meet the actress, drew to a close Friday night.

The winner—sorry HarperCollins, Ecco, and Little, Brown—was the flagship imprint of Random House. David Ebershoff, who has edited Norman Mailer, Gary Shteyngart, and Charles Bock, will work with Ms. Keaton, who intends to write...

Markus Dohle Anticipates Obama as Mr. Tough Choices

Tue, 20 Jan 2009 15:56:14 -0500

Maybe it’s all the inauguration business going to Pub Crawl’s head, but at the end of the day, you kind of have to hand it to Markus Dohle. The guy came out of nowhere—knew next to nothing of American book publishing when tapped last spring at the age of 39 to become CEO of Random House Inc.—and succeeded against all odds in drafting the blueprint for a radical restructuring of the company that not...

Sternlight, Tracy, Streitfeld, Scheier All Out at Random House as Flagship Division Reorganizes

Thu, 15 Jan 2009 14:33:30 -0500

The dramatic reorganization of Random House initiated a month and a half ago by new C.E.O. Markus Dohle came one step closer to completion this morning, as the publisher of the company's biggest division—the flagship Random House Publishing Group—sent a memo to staff announcing a new executive structure.

The length and complexity of the memo—written by RHPG’s president and publisher Gina Centrello—said it all: This reorganization really hurt, and a lot of...

Pantheon Publisher Janice Goldklang Latest Victim of Layoffs at Random House Inc.

Thu, 08 Jan 2009 15:42:38 -0500

Janice Goldklang, the head of Knopf's Pantheon Books imprint, has been let go after more than 25 years with the company amid the ongoing restructuring of Random House Inc.

Dan Frank, who oversees Pantheon's editorial department, referred all questions to Knopf's executive director of publicity, Paul Bogaards, who confirmed the fact of Ms. Goldklang's departure but declined to comment further.

Kimberly Burns, a freelance publicist who used to work for Ms. Goldklang at Pantheon, said...

Random House CEO Markus Dohle to Staff: "Our Future Has Begun" as "Evolutionary" 2008 Ends

Thu, 18 Dec 2008 10:09:53 -0500

Random House CEO Markus Dohle sent a long year-end letter to staff this morning outlining goals for 2009 and reaffirming that, despite "economic forecasts for 2009 [that are] growing more pessimistic each day," the company "will continue to spend several hundred million dollars to acquire and market" its books and maintain the "publishing independence and autonomy" of its 130 imprints worldwide.

As news of staff cuts at Random House's American units starts to trickle...

Shake-Up in Random House Sub Rights Department as Layoffs Begin

Wed, 17 Dec 2008 00:14:29 -0500

The fallout from Markus Dohle's reorganization of Random House has begun. It's unclear how many people were laid off yesterday (or how many still will be), but according to a source in the foreign rights world, a partial restructuring of the company's subsidiary rights operation has forced the elimination of at least two positions from Gina Centrello's Random House Publishing Group.

One of those, the source said, has been held for the past five...

Knopf Ascendant: Mehta Galaxy Grows In Random Big Bang

Tue, 09 Dec 2008 15:31:02 -0500

Reading the memo from Markus Dohle last Wednesday morning about the reorganization of Random House was an exercise in restraint. The temptation to skip ahead—to bypass the note’s soft top and find out as quickly as possible the part that unveiled, finally, after six silent months, how Random House Inc. would change under Mr. Dohle’s leadership—was overwhelming. The memo inspired in its recipients a nervous sort of skimming that should be familiar to anyone...

Knopf Posts Huge, Unusually Loud Ad on NYTimes.com as Part of Random House Corporate Initiative

Fri, 05 Dec 2008 17:05:59 -0500

The "Books=Gifts" promotional campaign that Random House C.E.O. Markus Dohle came up with last month sees its latest manifestation on The New York Times' Web site today, with a tall, bookmark-shaped Knopf ad that appears when you open any of the top stories. The ad is made up of three slides, all of them very much out of step aesthetically with the understated and sophisticated look that Knopf's designers and brand-managers usually strive for....

Markus Dohle Invites Random House Staff to Celebrate Year-End Accolades From Book Critics

Thu, 04 Dec 2008 16:30:34 -0500

In a company-wide memo sent to Random House staff this afternoon—labeled "a very different memo" by company spokesman Stuart Applebaum when he forwarded it to media—Markus Dohle turned a spotlight upon Random House's strong presence on year-end book lists published this week by The Toronto Globe and Mail and The New York Times Book Review.

Mr. Dohle delighted in the fact that fully nine of the ten books on the NYTBR list had been...

The End of an Era at Random House

Thu, 04 Dec 2008 11:03:59 -0500

Prior to yesterday morning, it appeared that maybe Markus Dohle had secretly climbed out through his bathroom window at some point during the past six months and gone home to Germany. The dapper but mildly off-putting 40-year-old had been appointed CEO of Random House Inc. back in May, and since then, as far as anyone could tell, he had done pretty much nothing. Most of the men and women of 1745 Broadway--from the editors...

Random House Memos on Irwyn Applebaum's Departure and Steve Rubin's Possible New Job

Wed, 03 Dec 2008 11:11:55 -0500

Here are the two memos that accompanied Random House C.E.O. Markus Dohle's big announcement this morning. The first concerns the elimination of Steve Rubin's job at the top of Doubleday and the possibility of his being appointed to a new job within the company. The second concerns Irwyn Applebaum, who will be leaving Random House now that his division there has been dismantled and absorbed into other parts of the company.

MARKUS DOHLE

...

Heads of New Publishing Groups at Random House Will Handle Layoffs Themselves

Wed, 03 Dec 2008 11:06:05 -0500

There will be no layoffs enacted at Random House today. According to Random House spokeswoman Carol Schneider, but the individual publishers at the top of the newly realligned groups will soon size up all the people now under their jurisdiction and "may have to make some difficult choices."

"If the layoffs are nececessary, those decisions are going to be made as objectively as possible and as quickly as possible, but I would venture...

Massive Reorganization at Random House: Steve Rubin, Irwyn Applebaum Step Down; Doubleday and Bantam Divisions Dismantled

Wed, 03 Dec 2008 10:38:25 -0500

The time bomb that was Random House for the past five months has finally exploded, as new C.E.O. Markus Dohle deployed a jaw-dropping memo this morning detailing a reorganization of the adult trade program that will see Bantam publisher Irwyn Applebaum and Doubleday publisher Steve Rubin step down and their imprints spread around to the company's other divisions.

Much, much more on this soon, but for now, the basics:

—Doubleday's flagship imprint and...

Publishing Bigshots Told to Open Canned Tuna, Eat at Desk

Tue, 25 Nov 2008 15:41:04 -0500

Though prayers this week should undoubtedly be with the editors of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, who were told a few days ago by their CEO that they can no longer afford to acquire new books, it should not go unremarked that editors at other houses are being forced to give up something almost as essential: lunch!

Though many agents say they’re still being wined and dined several times a week,...

Drudge: Godless Author Coulter Now Guilty

Tue, 25 Nov 2008 11:26:43 -0500

It's no blue dress, but Matt Drudge has himself a little scoop today. The title—and the strikingly familiar—cover of Ann Coulter's latest book. Sites like Pandagon and Gawker were intrigued by Random House's title-less touting of Ms. Coulter's next book ("Controversial. Confidential. Coulter," was all the publisher would say), but leave it to Mr. Drudge to get the scoop:

Bestselling author and controversialist Ann Coulter plans to crash Obama's inauguration party with her new...

Random House Outbid on Norman Mailer Bio; Simon & Schuster Pays Over Half a Million

Fri, 07 Nov 2008 11:57:15 -0500

David Rosenthal at Simon & Schuster announced today that he will be publishing a biography of Norman Mailer written by the late author's literary executor and longtime friend Michael Lennon. The book was sold at auction by Boston-based lawyer Ike Williams, who recently sold the memoirs of Mr. Mailer's widow, Norris Church, to Mr. Mailer's old editor at Random House. There were reportedly seven houses interested, with several offering advances worth more than half...

Stuff Publishers Like: Ready-Made Ideas That Package Themselves

Thu, 30 Oct 2008 12:12:33 -0400

The Stuff White People Like book that Random House published in July is still on The New York Times best seller list. Granted, it's at number 34, just one spot away from falling off (keep hanging on, The World Without Us), but still—it was less than a year ago that this thing was just a blog that some internet people thought was funny. Then in late March, Random House paid its author, Christian Lander,...

Everything's Pietschy At Lean and Mean Little, Brown

Tue, 28 Oct 2008 15:42:14 -0400

Michael Pietsch, Jamie Raab and Megan Tingley all dodged a bullet five years ago. For a moment there, it looked like their owners were going to sacrifice them, and the rest of the Time Warner Book Group, to Bertelsmann Inc., the German-based multimedia company that owns the largest publishing house in the world.

Mr. Pietsch, at least, could have expected to keep his job. Little, Brown & Co., the shop he’d been...

After Disappointing Year, Random House's Doubleday Division Cuts 16 Jobs

Tue, 28 Oct 2008 11:13:05 -0400

16 people at Random House's Doubleday division have been laid off, according to a report on the Publishers Marketplace online industry news portal. Doubleday spokesman David Drake is quoted as saying that jobs were cut in editorial, marketing, publicity, art, and ad promo departments across all of the group's imprints.

Random House corporate spokesman Stuart Applebaum emphasized that the company's new C.E.O., Markus Dohle, did not mandate the cuts. Mr. Drake said the same...

Did Ex-Random House CEO Peter Olson Just Tell Portfolio He Regrets Firing Ann Godoff?

Thu, 16 Oct 2008 12:32:49 -0400

Portfolio's Matt Malone interviewed ex-Random House CEO Peter Olson last month and no one noticed! Mr. Olson, who was given a teaching position at the Harvard Business School after German media conglomerate Bertelsmann removed him from the top of their publishing empire earlier this year, sounds like he's pretty happy to be out of the game, or at least at peace with it. Most of what he says is pretty anodyne, except for when...

Edward Volini Leaving Random House; Deputy Chairman and C.O.O. Leaving Effective September 30

Tue, 02 Sep 2008 15:22:37 -0400

Media Mob just received an email sent out to all Random House North American employees from Markus Dohle announcing the departure of Deputy Chairman and Chief Operating Officer Edward Volini.

The text of the memo follows. Expect more on this soon:

TO EVERYONE AT RANDOM HOUSE NORTH AMERICA...

Million Dollar Baby

Tue, 24 Jun 2008 15:19:58 -0400

Here’s a fairytale: A 28-year-old Columbia M.F.A. student named Reif Larsen wrote a novel about a whimsical child from Montana who likes maps, and suddenly all kinds of famous editors in New York were calling his agent, Denise Shannon, and telling her they really wanted to publish it.

Norton offered to preempt with an advance in the neighborhood of $400,000 if Ms. Shannon took the book off the market...

New Random House C.E.O. Markus Dohle to Staff: 'I Just Couldn't Wait To Start My New Job'

Tue, 03 Jun 2008 15:44:39 -0400

39-year-old Markus Dohle was installed as the new CEO of Random House yesterday morning; today, he sent a letter to his staff affirming his excitement and declaring his intention to preserve the company's "longstanding support for the independence of our publishers." There wasn't much in the letter besides that, except a short description up top of the weekend he spent in Los Angeles at the Book Expo. Mr. Dohle flew to L.A. from Germany...

Markus Dohle, 39, Random House CEO, Drops Into L.A. Bash

Tue, 03 Jun 2008 15:16:41 -0400

Los Angeles – Markus Dohle looked happy to be there, he really did. Clean-shaven and dressed in a stripey, light-gray suit, the sunny but intense 39-year-old walked around and smiled broadly at every person who shook his hand, and whenever anyone made a joke, he laughed with his whole body, sometimes even rocking back and forth. His auburn hair, punctuated with a playful blond streak, was slicked back...

Enter Markus Dohle: Random House Has a Green and Smiley New CEO

Mon, 02 Jun 2008 11:04:33 -0400

Random House has a new CEO today. Markus Dohle, 39, officially started this morning after a weekend spent at the Book Expo in Los Angeles. Mr. Dohle has already spent some time here in New York since being appointed to his new position by the head of Random House corporate parent Bertelsmann, spending a week in introductory meetings with Random’s division heads and other executives during the week of May 18th. The meetings,...

Report: Bertelsmann Names Industrial Engineering and Econ Major Named Markus Dohle to Head Random House

Tue, 20 May 2008 08:39:15 -0400

The Wall Street Journal has the story: Peter Olson's successor at Random House Inc. has been selected, and it's a German guy whom none of the publishers in New York have ever heard of. The name is Markus Dohle, and he comes from Arvato, the printing operation at Bertelsmann.

Mr. Dohle took over the top job at Arvato for Hartmut Ostrowski, who became chairman of the entire Bertelesmann corporation this past January. Mr. Ostrowski...

Report: Random House C.E.O. Peter Olson Will Step Down 'In the Next Few Weeks'

Mon, 05 May 2008 12:44:36 -0400

The New York Times is reporting that Peter Olson, who has been C.E.O. of Random House since 1998, will step down "in the next few weeks." Two unnamed executives from Random House's parent company Bertelsmann tell the Times' Mark Landler that pressure on Mr. Olson to vacate his post is coming from Bertelsmann's recently-appointed chief executive Hartmut Ostrowski, who "has lost patience with the performance" of Random House's U.S. book sales and "wants to...

Huge Book Deal From Random House for Jon-Jon Goulian, Manliest Bad Boy in New York Publishing

Thu, 17 Apr 2008 16:22:06 -0400

Jon-Jon Goulian, the bewildering intellectual androgyne who spent four years assisting Bob Silvers at the New York Review of Books, has sold a memoir to Random House for what a publishing source said was a sum in the high six figures.

Executive editor Kate Medina acquired the book in a preempt; literary agents Edward Orloff and Sarah Chalfant of The Wylie Agency, who submitted the proposal to several houses around town before...

'Stuff White People Like' Book Sold to Random House For At Least $350,000 (UPDATED)

Thu, 20 Mar 2008 16:36:46 -0400

You know that funny Web site Stuff White People Like, the one with the jokes? The Canadian guy who runs it just sold a book to Random House for an advance that publishing insiders said had reached at least $350,000 when it was at auction last week. Unclear how high it ended up climbing, but frankly, $350,000 is already a staggering sum for a paperback inspired by a faddish blog that launched just over...

Norman Mailer's Widow Writing Memoir For Random House

Tue, 26 Feb 2008 14:58:00 -0500

Norman Mailer's widow, Norris Church Mailer, is writing a memoir that will be published by Random House and edited by David Ebershoff, Publisher's Weekly reports. Mr. Ebershoff also edited Mailer's last four books, including his last, The Castle in the Forest.

The book was sold to Random House by John Taylor “Ike” Williams, who works in the literary and dramatic rights branch of Boston-based lawfirm Fish & Richardson, and who has served as Ms....

Bertelsmann Names Former C.E.O. Thielen Chairman of Supervisory Board

Fri, 11 Jan 2008 11:23:48 -0500

This past January, Gunter Thielen wrapped up his six year tenure as C.E.O. of Bertelsmann AG, the German corporation that owns the largest American publishing operation, Random House Inc.; today the Bookseller reports that Thielen has been named chairman of the company’s supervisory board.

Bertelsmann was most recently in the news when a German magazine reported (without citing sources) that it had offered Rupert Murdoch a billion dollars for HarperCollins, the book publishing arm of...

One Former Random House Editor Signs a Deal With Another as Karp Buys His Old Boss's Book Proposal

Wed, 12 Dec 2007 10:59:04 -0500

Less than six months after leaving his job as executive editor-in-chief of the Random House Publishing Group, Daniel Menaker has signed a book deal with his former colleague, Twelve publisher Jonathan Karp, to write A Good Talk, a primer on how to hold a good conversation, Publishers Weekly reports.

Mr. Karp served under Mr. Menaker at Random House for about two years before leaving to start his own imprint at Hachette Book Group USA.

Mr....

Best. BEA. Ever.

Fri, 23 Mar 2007 11:41:25 -0400

Jon Bon Jovi is "headlining" BEA, which is actually not a big concert but a book industry expo held in the Javits Center. PW Daily reports: The singer will perform, with Amy Grant, at Town Hall on June 2 during BEA. The rockers, who both have forthcoming titles from the Doubleday imprint Flying Dolphin Press, will hit the stage for charity as part of the Saturday Night Benefit, raising money for the Book Industry Foundation. Rock on! -...

A Leggy Stunner of Page Six Becomes Trump's Sexy Ghost

Sun, 29 Oct 2006 19:00:00 -0500

Last winter, my best friend Kate Bohner and I decided to do things backward and rent a house in the Hamptons. We got a house in November, the car (black Volkswagen Jetta) in December and the job in January. Actually, Kate got the job: ghostwriter for Donald Trump’s upcoming book. It was her job, but we both had to deal with the bumper sticker.

At first, I didn’t know if the bumper sticker...

A Leggy Stunner of Page Six Becomes Trump's Sexy Ghost

Sun, 29 Oct 2006 19:00:00 -0500

Twentysomethings Meet, Publish; A Gen Adrift On Internets— "To Steal Back the Innocence!"

Wed, 04 Oct 2006 07:23:49 -0400

Last night at Beauty Bar, the retro-themed watering hole in the East Village, a chatty gaggle gathered to laud the publication of the new Random House anthology "Twentysomething Essays by Twentysomething Writers." The book features 29 essays on topics ranging from the Serious—obsessive-compulsive disorder, rape, being gay when your mom is homophobic—to the more lighthearted, or what one might call the Universal Overachieved Twentysomething Experience, such as moving back in with your parents, discovering...

Brewing Up Bestsellers- Frazier, Albom, Ford & Co.

Sun, 24 Sep 2006 20:00:00 -0400

What do you do for a second act when your first novel spent more than a year on the best-seller list, won you a National Book Award and was made into a big-budget Hollywood movie starring Nicole Kidman? It’s hard to feel sorry for Charles Frazier (there are more than four million copies of Cold Mountain in print), but Thirteen Moons (Random House), a loose baggy monster that goes on sale on Oct. 3,...

Brewing Up Bestsellers— Frazier, Albom, Ford & Co.

Sun, 24 Sep 2006 20:00:00 -0400

What do you do for a second act when your first novel spent more than a year on the best-seller list, won you a National Book Award and was made into a big-budget Hollywood movie starring Nicole Kidman? It’s hard to feel sorry for Charles Frazier (there are more than four million copies of Cold Mountain in print), but Thirteen Moons (Random House), a loose baggy monster that goes on sale on Oct. 3,...

A Shameful Silence On Coulter's Spewing

Sun, 18 Jun 2006 20:00:00 -0400

That whiff of brimstone in the air may only be the match she is striking for her next cigarette. But her version of “Christianity” turns...

A Shameful Silence On Coulter’s Spewing

Sun, 18 Jun 2006 20:00:00 -0400

With the predictable regularity of a locust plague, Ann Coulter and her enablers at the once-reputable firm of Random House have issued yet another volume of fascistic entertainment. Now the hard-drinking, trash-talking, fortysomething bachelorette bills herself as a Christian moralist, in holy battle against the liberal heathens. That whiff of brimstone in the air may only be the match she is striking for her next cigarette. But her version of “Christianity” turns out to...

Harvard's Plagiarism Scandal, the Deconstruction Begins

Tue, 25 Apr 2006 10:00:04 -0400

If you want to know the facts about the Harvard plagiarism scandal, don't go to the Times' lame and protective coverage. The Harvard Crimson has thrashed the Times and all others on the Kaavya Viswanathan story. Today the Times failed to include a key statement in the case the Crimson reported, Random House's pointed charge to Little, Brown that its author Megan McCafferty, was robbed: "We are continuing to investigate this matter, but, given...

Off the Record

Sun, 29 Jan 2006 19:00:00 -0500

On Jan. 26, at the Congress Centre in Davos, Switzerland, New York Times publisher Arthur O. Sulzberger Jr. is scheduled to make his debut among the international power elite of the annual World Economic Forum.

This year’s Davos gathering, the 25th since the forum was founded in 1971, has the theme “The Creative Imperative.” It’s expected to include 2,340 participants from 89 countries—including 15 heads of state, 60 cabinet ministers, 21 ambassadors and...