Three executives have left Simon & Schuster Canada in recent weeks, including celebrated editor Nita Pronovost, while the publisher has brought in Indigo Books and Music veteran Jeremy Cammy as its new vice-president for marketing, publicity and events.
Pronovost was the vice-president and editor-in-chief for Canada at Simon & Schuster and has worked with such authors as Iain Reid and former Supreme Court chief justice Beverley McLachlin. She left Simon & Schuster last week, according to an internal announcement from publisher Kevin Hanson, dated Nov. 23 and shared with The Globe and Mail on Thursday.
In October, Felicia Quon, vice-president marketing and communications, as well as Adria Iwasutiak, vice-president, director of publicity and Canadian sales, departed the publisher.
Simon & Schuster did not immediately comment when asked by The Globe about the departures. But in Hanson’s internal memo, he called Pronovost a “consummate team player” who has “always demonstrated that by working cohesively and collaboratively with her colleagues across departments, great things are possible.”
He also celebrated Cammy’s hiring in a separate note to staff. “He is a people person who is collaborative by nature and is a committed and effective team builder,” Hanson wrote. Cammy “brings a deep knowledge of book retail and marketing in Canada alongside a passion for innovation that will serve us as we expand our publishing program with an eye to supporting our authors both in Canada and [the] United States.”
Cammy, a marketing executive by trade, spent more than 25 years at Indigo, most recently as a vice-president and executive producer of events.
The past few months have seen several major shakeups of Simon & Schuster’s senior ranks in Canada. Former HarperCollins non-fiction editorial director Jim Gifford joined as an executive editor this fall, as did Rosemary Shipton, the founding co-director of Toronto Metropolitan University’s publishing program. Sarah St. Pierre took on Pronovost’s previous title of editorial director at the same time.
Pronovost is also an active fiction author, writing under the name Nita Prose. Her 2022 debut murder mystery The Maid has sold more than a million copies in North America alone, and has been optioned for a film expected to be produced by and starring Florence Pugh. Its sequel, The Mystery Guest, was published this week by Viking in Canada.
The private-equity firm KKR closed its US$1.62-billion purchase of Simon & Schuster in October. The acquisition followed years of drama over the publisher’s ownership, after its former owner Paramount Global – previously known as ViacomCBS – attempted to sell it to the book giant Penguin Random House. That sale was blocked a year ago by a U.S. federal judge who argued it would lessen competition in book sales.
Josh O’Kane