Egmont Shutting Down USA Division
I covered this in October but at the time, Egmont was hoping to get a buyer to keep the division intact. Sadly, that didn’t pan out.
Attempts to sell Egmont USA since October 2014 have not resulted in any final agreements. As a consequence, Egmont has decided to close the office, effective from January 31st 2015.
The spring 2015 list will be published and books will continue to be available via Random House.
Egmont published some fantastic young adult titles by authors like Ilsa J. Bick and Walter Dean Myers. This sucks.
Harry Potter Fans Convince Warner Bros To Go Fair Trade Certified
Right before Christmas, Warner Bros. quietly gave “Harry Potter” fans what was, for some of them, a long-wished-for gift. In a letter to Andrew Slack, the founder of the Harry Potter Alliance, Joshua Berger, the company’s president for Harry Potter Global Franchise Development, announced, “By the end of 2015, and sooner when possible, all Harry Potter chocolate products sold at Warner Bros. outlets and through our licensed partners will be 100-percent UTZ or Fair Trade certified.”
Go and read the rest of Alyssa Rosenberg’s article because it’s a great write up on the group, Harry Potter Alliance, and their fight against issues such as poverty. What were you saying about Harry Potter again?
The Ultimate “Check Your Privilege” Goes To…
A parent from a wealthy Texas town challenges a book being read in the high school. The book in question? David K. Shipler’s The Working Poor: Invisible in America. What’s wrong with it?
In the complaint, the parent objected to the book’s depiction of abortion, and sexual abuse and to its portrayal of women “as weak, pathetic, ignorant, sexual objects and incapable beings.”
The problem is that it discusses poverty and the issues that stem from poverty. What did the parent suggest instead? Out of the Dust by Karen Hesse, We the Living by Ayn Rand and America the Beautiful by Ben Carson (FYI Buzzfeed has reported that Carson’s book had plagiarized from multiple sources).
Watson The Supercomputer Is Truly Talented. He’s Written A Cookbook!
The Institute of Culinary Education has teamed up with IBM to create a cookbook with recipes from Watson, the tech company’s cognitive computing system. The new book, Cognitive Cooking with Chef Watson, will be published by Sourcebooks in April.
I’m curious as to what the food would taste like from a supercomputer. More importantly, what would Julia Childs think of this??? Fanfiction!
