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Founded | 1988 (as Publisher's Design Service and Publisher's Distribution Service) |
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Founder | Jerrold Jenkins |
Headquarters | Traverse City, Michigan, US |
Key people |
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Website | jenkinsgroupinc |
Jenkins Group, Inc. is a book publishing and marketing company based in Traverse City, Michigan, USA. It was established in 1988 as Publisher's Design Service and Publisher's Distribution Service, then was incorporated as Jenkins Group in 1995. It provides custom book publishing and marketing services and has founded several book awards programs. [1]
A contest created in 1996 and nicknamed the "IPPY" Awards, this program is open to independently published titles written in English. According to its website, the awards seek to "reward those who exhibit the courage, innovation, and creativity to bring about change in the world of publishing." [2] Entrants can choose from 88 general awards categories as well as e-book categories and regional categories in North America, Europe, and Oceania. [3]
This award was founded in 2006 and with its 40+ categories aims to recognize children's books that may otherwise have been overlooked by larger, more general contests. Since 2010, the awards ceremony has been held as part of the Traverse City Children's Book Festival. [4] [5] [6]
Established in 2007, this program targets new and innovative works in the business world across 23 categories. [7] [8] [9]
Living Now medals have been awarded to "lifestyle, homestyle, world-improvement and self-improvement" books since 2008, with a new digital media category introduced in 2021. [10] [11] In 2016, they also introduced the Evergreen Book Medals for titles created in the new millennium that contribute to "positive global change". [12]
This contest began in 2009 and awards 66 categories of electronic publishing. It includes not only books, but also publications such as author websites and book trailers. [13]
The newest of Jenkins Group's award programs, Illumination was started in 2013 to recognize leading authors in Christian publishing. [14] [15]
The awards established by Jenkins Group were criticized by Writer Beware, an advocacy blog sponsored by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America, listing them among others that purportedly benefit the organizer more than the winners and noting that "even among profiteers, however, Jenkins is unusual in the amount of extra merchandise it hawks to winners." [16] The Alliance of Independent Authors also gave all six Jenkins awards its worst rating, reserved for "contests with more serious concerns". Notes for some of the contests included "relentless marketing and upselling" and "the site's FAQ notes that judges may not even read the books". [17]
Established in 2023, Concept to Cover is a podcast hosted by Leah Nicholson that features editors, writers, and ghostwriters, and more leaders in the book industry. [18]
Established in 2023, Behind The Cover is a podcast hosted by Amy Shamroe that features award-winning authors and a look behind the scenes with those in the book industry. [19]
The Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America, doing business as Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers Association, commonly known as SFWA is a nonprofit 501(c)(3) organization of professional science fiction and fantasy writers. While SFWA is based in the United States, its membership is open to writers worldwide. The organization was founded in 1965 by Damon Knight under the name Science Fiction Writers of America. The president of SFWA as of July 1, 2021 is Jeffe Kennedy.
A vanity press or vanity publisher, sometimes also subsidy publisher, is a publishing house where the author pays to have the book published, and signs a restrictive contract which involves surrendering significant rights. It is not to be confused with hybrid publishing, or assisted self-publishing.
The Underground Literary Alliance is a Philadelphia-based and internationally membered group of writers, zinesters and DIY writers. They seek to expose what they see as the corruption and insularity in the American book-publishing establishment while providing alternative avenues for writers who don't easily fit into mainstream institutions and agendas.
An author mill is a publisher that relies on producing large numbers of small-run books by different authors, as opposed to a smaller number of works published in larger numbers. The term was coined by Victoria Strauss of Writer Beware, as a parallel formation from diploma mill, an unaccredited college or university that offers degrees without regard to academic achievement, and puppy mill, a breeding operation that produces large numbers of puppies for sale with little regard for breed purity, puppy placement, health, or socialization.
The British Book Awards or Nibbies are literary awards for the best UK writers and their works, administered by The Bookseller. The awards have had several previous names, owners and sponsors since being launched in 1990, including the National Book Awards from 2010 to 2014.
Chetan Bhagat is an Indian author, columnist, and YouTuber. He was listed in Time magazine's list of World's 100 Most Influential People in 2010. Five of his novels have been adapted into films.
Fiction Collective Two (FC2) is an author-run, not-for-profit publisher of avant-garde, experimental fiction supported in part by the University of Utah, the University of Alabama Press, Central Michigan University, Illinois State University, private contributors, arts organizations and foundations, and contest fees.
Scott Carl Sigler is an American author of science fiction and horror and a podcaster. Scott is a New York Times No. 1 bestselling author of nineteen novels, seven novellas, dozens of short stories, and thousands of podcast episodes. He is a co-founder of Empty Set Entertainment, which publishes his young adult Galactic Football League series. He lives in San Diego.
Author Solutions is the parent company of the self publishing companies/imprints AuthorHouse, iUniverse, Trafford Publishing, Xlibris, Palibrio, and Booktango. Author Solutions also maintains partnerships with traditional book publishers Simon & Schuster, Thomas Nelson, Hay House, and Guideposts ; as well as with Writer's Digest.
David Weinberger is an American author, technologist, and speaker. Trained as a philosopher, Weinberger's work focuses on how technology — particularly the internet and machine learning — is changing our ideas, with books about the effect of machine learning’s complex models on business strategy and sense of meaning; order and organization in the digital age; the networking of knowledge; the Net's effect on core concepts of self and place; and the shifts in relationships between businesses and their markets.
Gail Sidonie Sobat is a Canadian writer, educator, singer and performer. She is the founder and coordinator of YouthWrite, a writing camp for children, a non-profit and charitable society. Her poetry and fiction, for adults and young adults, are known for her controversial themes. For 2015, Sobat was one of two writers in residence with the Metro Edmonton Federation of Libraries. She is also the founder of the Spoken Word Youth Choir in Edmonton.
Phil Simon is an American speaker, professor, and author. He writes about management, technology, disruption, communication, and analytics.
A vanity award is an award in which the recipient purchases the award and/or marketing services to give the false appearance of a legitimate honor. Pitches for Who's Who-type publications, biographies or nominations for awards or special memberships can have a catch to them in which the honoree is required to pay for recognition.
The Independent Publisher Book Awards, also styled the IPPY Awards, are a set of annual book awards for independently published titles. They are the longest-running unaffiliated contest open exclusively to independent presses. The IPPY Awards are open to authors and publishers worldwide who produce books written in English and intended for the North American market. According to the IPPY website, the awards "reward those who exhibit the courage, innovation, and creativity to bring about change in the world of publishing."
LID Publishing, more commonly referred to as "LID", is a publishing and communications company founded in 1993. Specialising in general business publications for the professional reader LID is headquartered in Madrid and London with satellite offices in Mexico City, Shanghai, New Delhi, New York City, Buenos Aires and Bogotá. LID is a member of The Business Publishers Roundtable.
Soren Marcus Kaplan is an author, consultant, and speaker on the subject of innovation and innovation culture in organizations. He is an Affiliate at the Center for Effective Organizations at the University of Southern California's Marshall School of Business, founder of the consulting firm InnovationPoint, co-founder of the software company Praxie.com, and is a columnist for the Innovate column of Inc. Magazine.
Jodie Cook is an entrepreneur and author from Birmingham, UK. Cook featured in Forbes’ Europe's 30 Under 30 list of social entrepreneurs in 2017. She is an international powerlifter for Great Britain.
The Bestseller Experiment is a podcast by two writers, Mark Stay and Mark Desvaux, who each week discuss different aspects of writing and publishing with guests from the publishing industry, such as other authors, editors, or marketing experts.
Vivian Lorraine Stephens is an American editor of romance novels, literary agent, and founder of Romance Writers of America (RWA). While at Dell Publishing, she created and was the editor of Candlelight Ecstasy, a romance line that revolutionized the genre in the 1980s. In 1980, as part of the Candlelight Romance line, she published Entwined Destinies by Rosalind Welles, the first category romance novel by an African-American author to feature African-American main characters. "A Black editor in a predominantly white industry, Stephens sought to incorporate the voices of women of color into the burgeoning romance industry." Over the course of her career, Stephens helped launch Sandra Kitt, Jayne Ann Krentz, and Beverly Jenkins, among others.
Michelle Penelope King is a white South African born journalist, writer, women's rights activist and advocate for gender equality. Since December 2019, King has been director of inclusion at Netflix, a department responsible for inclusion and diversity among corporate employees.