Media Decoder Blog: Jennifer Egan Leaves Knopf for Scribner

Pulitzer Prize Board, via Associated Press Jennifer Egan

The Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist Jennifer Egan quietly switched publishers this summer, joining Scribner, a division of Simon Schuster, from Alfred A. Knopf, a division of Random House.

“I have known and read Jenny Egan for 25 years, and I am ecstatic about working with her on her next books,” said Nan Graham, who was recently promoted to publisher at Scribner and who played a key role in wooing Ms. Egan. “She is as dedicated and brilliant and compassionate as any novelist writing today.”

Ms. Egan only published two books with Knopf: “The Keep” (2006) and “A Visit From the Goon Squad” (2010). But both were well reviewed, and “Goon Squad” won numerous awards, culminating in the Pulitzer Prize for fiction.

Yet despite this impressive record under her editor at Knopf, Jordan Pavlin, Ms. Egan decided it was time to move on.

Both she and her agent, Binky Urban of International Creative Management, said that they did not want to get into why the move was made and that the move was not news because it was widely known within the industry.

Publishing sources pointed out that before she was with Knopf, Ms. Egan had a three-book deal with Doubleday and then moved on. They also said she was offered seven figures for a two-book deal with Simon Schuster as an extra enticement.

In a sign of the author’s sensitivity about the move, the news was not announced publicly by Scribner’s at the time.

When asked why she had kept the coup under wraps, Ms. Graham said it was timing. “We had hoped to wait until Jenny had finished a new novel,” she said, “and we could shout from the rooftops about the book we were going to publish.”

Ms. Egan said her next book would be ready in two years at the soonest.

Article source: http://mediadecoder.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/12/18/without-any-fanfare-jennifer-egan-switches-publishers/?partner=rss&emc=rss