War, or selling books about war, is anything but hell for Casemate in Havertown, Pa., one of the largest military book distributors in the U.S. With the addition of Weidenfeld & Nicolson's military titles and Cassell Military, both imprints of the Orion Publishing Group in the U.K., three-year-old Casemate now represents 22 publishers. The company also continues to publish books on military history, politics and current events. Its lead title for the summer is due out in August, The Wars of the Bushesby historian Stephen Tanner.
Another U.K. house, the London arm of Tokyopop, announced that it is moving its U.K. distribution to Littlehampton Book Services. It is part of the manga publisher's continued expansion into Europe, which includes new operations in Germany. On this side of the Atlantic, Diamond Book Distributors drew up a book trade agreement with another manga powerhouse, Digital Manga, publisher of Ikebukuro West Gate Park (Volumes 1—3) and Worst (volumes 1—3), and with comic book and collectible publisher Dynamic Forces. Diamond is also DF's exclusive distributor to the U.S. hobby and comic book specialty markets.
Consortium Book Sales & Distribution in St. Paul, Minn., announced that it is adding another seven publishers this fall, including Bitter Lemon Press, an independent publisher in London that launched earlier this year to publish literary thrillers and crime novels from Europe, North Africa and Latin America. Other publishers now in the Consortium bag include Anvil Press Poetry, also based in England; five-year-old poetry publisher Ausable Press, in Keene, N.Y.; Bywater Books, in Ann Arbor, Mich., specializing in lesbian fiction; Center for Environmental Structure Publishing in Berkeley, Calif., publishers of Christopher Alexander's four-volume book on the relationship between the art of building and the nature of the universe, The Nature of Order; de.MO, a design and publishing firm based in Millbrook, N.Y.; and the lilaguide in San Francisco, publishers of the lilaguides to baby-friendly stores and activities.
Although Bookworld Companies in Sarasota, Fla., assumed distribution for many of the publishers left orphaned by the closing of Words Distributing Company after the bankruptcy of its parent, BookPeople, several other presses have been adopted for distribution in recent weeks. Both Down There Press and Spinsters Ink are now represented to the trade by SCB; Belle Tress Books and Moment Point Press by Red Wheel Weiser; Keep It Simple Books/Zen Meditation Center and Cheri Huber's Present Perfect Books by Independent Publishers Group; Simply Read Books and Uglytown by Publishers Group West and Origin Press; Napoleon Publishing and Rendezvous Press by Atlas Books/BookMasters Inc.
With its acquisition of the Law in Context series from Lexis Nexis UK, Cambridge University Press will take over sales, marketing and distribution for the series in North America. Law in Context was previously distributed to the trade by Northwestern University Press.
