High Finance, Part I

So on Friday the 8th, I get a call from a company identified as Epiq Systems asking for my fax number so they can send over some documents related to a bankruptcy. Now, that's not the kind of call you get every day, and they won't tell me whose bankruptcy they have in mind.

It turns out when papers start to come on Monday to be that of a company called Haights Cross Communication, which is the parent company of the prominent long-time audio publisher Recorded Books. Which publishes Charlaine Harris, Brandon Sanderson, Kat Richardson and Peter V. Brett from the JABberwocky list, and you can figure with authors like that, there are some royalties Recorded owes me.

But the bankruptcy is actually a good thing. I think.

Haights Cross took on too heavy a debt load four or five years ago, as many people and places did. Unlike many of them, they were able to enter negotiations with their major lendors and come to an agreement, announced in September, for a debt-for-equity swap involving a significant haircut for the lendors, with the intention to file for a pre-packaged bankruptcy petition and to continue doing business as usual all the way through. Motion 8 is for an Order Authorizing the Debtors to Pay Prepetition Claims of Trade Creditors [I think that's me] in the Ordinary Course of Business.

So as bankruptcies go...

But the interesting thing is all of the things that come out of the woodwork.

Even before the official Notice of Filing for which Epiq needed my fax number -- and there Epiq is, Motion 9 of the First Day Motions, Docket No. 11, authorizing retention of Epiq as the Claims and Noticing Agent -- I get a fax from a credit arbitrage company called Credit Liquidity, LP, which is offering to buy out my claim for 74.6 cents on the dollar. First Come, First Served, Must Respond by January 15. Why, if you didn't read the documents carefully, you'd think this was an official communication. The fax cover sheet blares in very big letters "LEGAL DOCUMENT REGARDING HAIGHTS CROSS COMMUNICATIONS BANKRUPTCY."

If you get around to reading the FAQ, they do hide in question #4 that CL is not related in any way to the company. They also have enough caveats in the FAQ to hide a very large emptor. They'll pay my 74.6 cents "unless issues develop in the bankrupty court proceedings which ay delay us in processing the claim or purchasing the claim." They "may not purchase the claim ... due to ... specific case issues, litigation or other perceived problems with the bankruptcy proceedings."

Which is to say that if you don't look carefully, you can give Creditor Liquidity a quick profit as they pay 74.6 cents in a two or three weeks and then get paid a dollar in two or three months, but if anything happens where it looks like the pre-packaged bankruptcy proceeding won't actually result in business as usual, they'll back away from their offer. Quickly.

Then on Tuesday, it's an attorney in a Florida affiliate of my accounting firm that wants to invite me to throw my hat into the ring for serving on the Creditor Committee.

In a contentious bankruptcy, this group of creditors with their own counsel and experts and staff all paid for by the debtor company as part of the proceeding, would keep an eye on things and represent the interests of the creditors. Because US bankruptcy law gives current management the first shot at reorganizing the company, this is a little weight on the other side of the scale to be sure they aren't doing things that help themselves more than the people who hope to get some recovery out of the bankruptcy proceeding.

But the call from the attorney isn't about me. Rather, if I volunteer and am chosen -- well, I'll need to have somebody actually looking after my interests because I'm not going to head off to Wilmington for every hearing, and those billable hours are a court-protected cost out of the debtor's pocket.

So it's nice to be wanted. I would certainly volunteer, because JABberwocky does have a decent amount listed as owed in the filings, I'm as good an agent as any to speak up for agents that are owed money on this (Scovil Galen Ghosh is one of a handful of others with solid amounts listed). It would be an interesting experience to be part of the process, maybe even more interesting than jury duty. So there's more to be gained experientially from this than from selling my claim for 74.6 cents on the dollar, but let's be clear that isn't about me.

BEA 2009, Pt. 1

BEA, or Book Expo America, is the big trade show for trade publishing in the United States, and was held in New York City a couple weeks ago.  I'll do some posts over the next several days either about or inspired by the event.  Here are some photos I took (or in some cases, mis-took, because they're blurrier than we would want; I guess I'm not a professional photographer).

The first comes from inside the Javits Center, where a nice Sookie Stackhouse display was at the front entrance to the Penguin booth.  Very nice views of the current DEAD AND GONE hardcover and the True Blood Season 2 tie-in edition cover for LIVING DEAD IN DALLAS.  I am very fond of both.  And then there was the big, bold, beautiful True Blood billboard on W. 39th St. at the intake into the Lincoln Tunnel, and isn't that a nice way to start and finish the day heading to and from the Javits Center each day.

The next very blurry picture was taken at the Prometheus Books booth.  The wonderful Pyr SF line edited by Lou Anders is part of the Prometheus empire, and they had a big poster up for GEOSYNCHRON, the concluding novel in the Jump 225 trilogy by David Louis Edelman.  Prometheus was also giving out copies of the new premium-size mass market edition of CROSSOVER by Joel Shepherd, so the JABberwocky list was well-represented in this corner.

  

At the Severn House booth, it was nice to see the forthcoming historical mystery ANGEL OF THE GLADE by Scott Mackay on their display shelf.    And there on the right, I'll also mention Marcia Talley's new book, because Marcia Talley is a wonderful person whom I've known by way of Charlaine Harris for many many years.  It always brings a smile to my face when I see Marcia, and it brings a smile to my face to see her book at BEA as well.

Finally, this was a very special BEA because it's the first time in all my years in the business that I had an author officially at BEA, with an official signing in the official signing area and on a panel and totally getting the full royal BEA treatment.  So we have a picture of Brandon Sanderson participating in a panel with 

Jonathan Tropper for authors of books that had been mentioned in the Editor's Buzz panel the day before, and then we have a picture of Brandon doing his official signing of copies of new novel WARBREAKER while his editor Moshe Feder is standing up in order to take a picture of Brandon's very long signing line. Brandon also had an ALA autographing and did an interview for BookSpotCentral.  He and I met up with the people at Macmillan Audio and recorded some video that will be used to promote the audio release of The Gathering Storm.  We discussed possible comic book adaptations of Brandon's work with a couple of comic book publishers.  

I should have taken pictures at the JABberwocky dinner, where Brandon joined myself, my JABberwocky associate Eddie Schneider (celebrating his first anni on the JABberwocky team, Peter V. Brett, the publisher of Recorded Books, our man in China, our summer interns, and World's Biggest Bookstore bookseller Jessica Strider and her husband at Rachel's.  A good time was had by all.  It was my first time going to Rachel's, and I will happily go there again.  It's convenient to the theater district and the food generally received high marks.