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The Bookseller reports "Peter Mayer is to be awarded with a lifetime achievement award at this year's London Book Fair, following in the steps of Lord Weidenfeld, Christopher MacLehose, John Lyons, and Lynette Owen. Mayer will pick up the fifth annual LBF/Trilogy Lifetime Achievement Award in International Publishing at the London Book Fair on Tuesday 15th April at a special reception in the Earls Court Conference Centre. The award, voted for by the London Book Fair's advisory board, was unanimously agreed after the merits of a shortlist of six international publishing figures were debated. This year's judges commented that Peter Mayer had made an outstanding lifelong contribution to the international publishing industry through his various roles including Penguin India. From 1978 to 1996 he was the chairman and c.e.o. of the Penguin Group, based in London and New York. Since 1996 he has held the position of president and publisher of The Overlook Press and since 2003 he has been the president and publisher of Duckworth Publishers in the UK. Simon Master, chair of the advisory board, said: "Peter Mayer has long been an inspirational figure in the publishing industry both in the UK and overseas. His dedication to British and international publishing has distinguished his career and makes him fully deserving of the London Book Fair/Trilogy Lifetime Achievement Award 2008."

Author: Shirin Yim Bridges
Illustrator: Sophie Blackall (on JOMB)
Published: 2002 Chronicle Books (on JOMB)
ISBN: 0811834905 Chapters.ca Amazon.com

The hush of dependable peaches and greens gently gives way to a crescendo of red in this thoughtfully unfolding, true story of a young girl with a dream — and the patient, respectful cracking of cultural constraints that made her dream come true.

You can help make a dream come true today by joining the effort to provide schooling and stability for autistic children in China. To learn more click here.

Dear Friends,
I don’t write letters very often in support of our books. This one is really worth special attention. The world has always been interested in something other than what our moms or dads told us, what our teachers told us, what our churches told us, what the media told us. As we get older there’s often a deep suspicion about received wisdom. In a new book that arrives in bookstores this week,The Secret History of the World, brilliant editor and author Mark Booth has, after a lifetime of research, assembled a book that looks at the deepest histories of our universe and of our world—three thousand years of hidden knowledge and wisdom. Booth’s is a relentless approach, charging through time and space and thought in interdisciplinary fashion: Booth covers Lewis Carroll, Philip K. Dick, Schrödinger, Duchamp, and Bob Dylan with equal flair; and he deals with the subjects of Cognitive Science, Religion, Psychology, Historiography, and of course Philosophy in drawing up this new history of our world. I don’t think Overlook has ever published a book at once so marvelously speculative and so solemnly grounded by research into the corners of our lives and often the well springs of our religious and political beliefs, whether they be Greek and Egyptian mythology, Jewish folklore, Christian cults, Gnosticism, early American philosophy, Catholic conspiracy theory, Freemasons, Rosicrucians, the Illuminati, and people like Shakespeare, Washington, Newton, Dostoevsky, Wagner, Hitler… all of them do more than make their appearance in these pages. I think this book will sell and sell, this season and this year, and for many years. It is certainly unlike any book we’ve ever published, nor are we likely to come upon another one. Please take a look at The Secret History of the World.

Peter Mayer
Publisher
The Overlook Press

The New York Center for Independent Publishing (NYCIP) will hold its Winter Benefit Gala on Thursday, December 13. This year, our own Peter Mayer, publisher of Overlook Press, will be the recipient of NYCIP's Poor Richard Award for outstanding contributions to independent book publishing. The award will be presented to Mr. Mayer by special guest presenter Ed Victor, the internationally renowned literary agent. Tickets are available for purchase through the General Society of Mechanics and Tradesman, 20 W.44th Street, in New York City.

Peter Mayer, President and Publisher of The Overlook Press, will be this year’s recipient of the New York Center for Independent Publishing’s (NYCIP) Poor Richard Award for outstanding contributions to independent book publishing. The award will be presented to Mr. Mayer by special guest presenter Ed Victor, the internationally renowned literary agent, at the NYCIP’s Winter Benefit. The Center is an educational program of the non-profit organization, The General Society of Mechanics and Tradesmen (GSMT). The Benefit will be held on Thursday, December 13, 2007, at The General Society’s literary landmark building at 20 West 44th Street in Midtown Manhattan.

“We feel privileged to be honoring an independent publisher of Peter’s stature,” said Karin Taylor, the NYCIP’s Executive Director. “The Poor Richard Award is a way of recognizing the importance of independent publishers to our society. Peter’s decision to leave the corporate publishing world and enter the field of independent publishing full-time is an inspiration to our publisher members. Most important, in this era of thinning mid-lists, Overlook is a refuge for meritorious books that might otherwise go unpublished.”

Benefit tickets are available by calling the NYCIP headquarters (212.764.7021) or by emailing Christopher de la Torre ([email protected]). All proceeds will benefit the Center for Independent Publishing, a non-profit cultural and educational program of the GSMT, serving the independent publishing community.

The 2007 Miami Book Fair International begins this Sunday and runs through November 11. One of the biggest, and perhaps the best, book festivals in the world, this eight day event includes a wide variety of literary activities. On Thursday, November 8, Overlook Publisher Peter Mayer will participate in The Translation Market, a one day educational forum that makes its debut this year. Peter will join Sara Nelson from Publishers Weekly; Daniel Halpern, Ecco/Harper Collins; Amy Hundley and Morgan Entrekin, Grove/Atlantic Monthly; and Barbara Epler, New Directions; in a session on the world translation market. The panel will take place in Room 1261, Bldg. 1, on the Wolfson Campus of Miami Dade College in downtown Miami.

Our beloved publisher & president Peter Mayer was quoted in today's Philadelphia Inquirer weighing in on the recent battle for more book review pages in newspapers. It's like music to a publicist's ears! Give 'em hell, boss!