Bloomsbury Publishing is pleased to announce that as of 1st January 2014 it will be taking over representation of Oneworld Publications and Verso Books (UK) in the Australian and New Zealand markets.

Oneworld is committed to the old-fashioned principles of great writing, editorial excellence, high production values, and marketing flair, to produce books that are read by the intellectually curious all over the world. Louise Sherwin-Stark, MD, Bloomsbury Publishing, says, ‘Over the last month we’ve been delighted to start working on the Oneworld list.  They publish simply delicious looking books with must read premises and prize winning potential.’

Verso Books is the largest independent, radical publishing house in the English-speaking world. Louise Sherwin-Stark says, ‘The Verso stable of authors has the potential to create great political and cultural debate in the media and at our festivals, with books to confront, challenge and excite readers.’

New titles will be sold in with the February 2014 New Titles release programme and Allen & Unwin will commence taking orders for backlist titles from the beginning of January. Macmillan Palgrave will transfer all backorders as at 31 December 2013 to Bloomsbury Publishing.

Macmillan Palgrave must receive returns requests by 14th February 2014 for authorisation and physical returns need to delivered to Macmillan Distribution Services by 28th February 2014. All credits for authorised returns will be finalised by MDS by 31 March 2014 when they are closing. UBD will in only accept returns for titles purchased through UBD. For further information please contact your Allen & Unwin account manager or UBD 1 800 33 88 36

Palgrave Macmillan regrets to advise that from 1 January 2014 we will no longer represent I.B.Tauris as they are moving to Footprint Books.

Please also be advised that effective 31 December 2013 we will cease representation for Acumen Publishing and Interlink Publishing. Existing backorders will be transferred.

In all cases credits for authorised returns must be finalised with Macmillan Distribution Services by 31 March 2014. Returned stock will not be accepted after 28 February 2014.

Sydney-based publisher Xmplar have made a breakthrough in desktop publishing and released cop-e-boox v 0.2 (Basenji), a bundle of open-source publishing stylesheets and book templates. An interactive browser display makes it easy to change book styles, and examples of ebooks with markup give users a head start in producing their own ebooks.

If you’re an editor or publisher and want to learn how to make ebooks using markup languages, cop-e-boox is an easy way to understand digital publishing technologies. Ever wanted to check out trial versions of XML software but never had any files to use? Cop-e-boox has them. Best of all, you can explore everything in cop-e-boox at your own pace—for free (it’s open source, you see).

Until now, only large publishers have used XML because specialists were needed. But now, cop-e-boox lets average users change text, graphics, page layout and document structure for three ebook formats— interactive PDF, valid EPUB 3.0 and HTML 5 web pages. We’ve done all the hard work and made it simple to set up book layout features from a huge range of formatting options.

With a little training—a free ebook is included to get you started—you can use the tagging and graphics in ready-assembled documents. The only extras you need for a complete desktop publishing setup are entry-level XML editing and typesetting software. Cop-e-boox comes with lots of examples of complex hyperlinked documents—cover images, half title pages, TOCs and LOTs, prelims, part titles, end matter and even embedded indexing.

Cop-e-boox is designed for self-learning—gradually learn the basics of markup, explore samples, edit book tagging and start producing your own ebooks. Small publishers can use cop-e-boox with affordable desktop XML packages and are not locked into any proprietary system. Get the free cop-e-boox stylesheets at www.xmplar.biz and check out demo videos on our YouTube channel.

Allen & Unwin is delighted at the news that Eleanor Catton’s The Luminaries has won the 2013 Man Booker Prize for Fiction.

It’s particularly exciting that Eleanor Catton hails from our part of the world and is also at 28 the youngest Man Booker winner in the prize’s history.

The Luminaries Eleanor Catton (Granta) $29.99 9781847088765

‘It’s a dazzling book, it’s a luminous book, it is vast without being sprawling’ said the chairman of the judging panel, Robert Macfarlane.

‘An elegant complexity animates this fine novel. The Luminaries is a remarkable tour de force.’ Andrew Riemer, Sydney Morning Herald

Warm congratulations to Eleanor Catton and Granta from everyone at Allen & Unwin.

The reprint with updated cover will be available as soon as possible.

To order please contact your Allen & Unwin account manager or UBD 1800-33-88-36