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News stories from the book world in January 2017

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January 2017

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US ebook unit sales declined 15%, but there's good news on children's publishing

30 January 2017

Nielsen has just reported that ebook sales in the US declined a rather surprising 15% in 2016, as compared with 2015. There seem to have been two reasons for this.  Read more

Is it bad news that Bertelsmann is consolidating its ownership of Penguin Random House?

23 January 2017

Some nervousness has been expressed by authors and staff in the last few days about the impending purchase by Bertelsmann of part of the Pearson share of Penguin Random House, but is there really much reason to feel anxious about this?  Read more

Penguin Random House change - Bertelsmann to buy out partner Pearson

16 January 2017

The first major publishing news of the New Year has been the announcement that Pearson, having declared a profit warning because of change and volatility in the educational market and declining sales in higher education, is intending to offload its 47% stake in Penguin Random House - and its partner Bertelsmann is keen to acquire it.  Read more

The publishing world as 2016 turns into 2017

2 January 2017

Amongst the predictions springing up as we move into the new year, a hard figure is the most astonishing. The slowing-down of ebook sales is well-documented but it is quite startling that the first figure of 2017 is that the UK print market sold 195 million books in 2016, an increase of almost 7% on 2015, and volume increased by 4.5%.  Read more