Random House Publishing Group

The Random House Publishing Group was formed in 2003, uniting the two divisions formerly known as the Random House Trade Group and the Ballantine Books Group. Publishing in all formats--hardcover, trade paperback and mass market--it encompasses the following imprints: Ballantine Books, Ballantine Reader's Circle, Del Rey, Fawcett, Ivy, Modern Library, One World, Presidio Press, Random House, Random House Trade Paperbacks, and Villard.

The flagship imprint of Random House, Inc., Random House had its origins in l925, when Bennett Cerf and Donald Klopfer, two New Yorkers in their mid-twenties, acquired a line of classics and contemporary American works called The Modern Library from publisher Horace Liveright. The company assumed the name Random House two years later when Cerf and Klopfer decided to publish a few books on the side, "at random." Their artist friend Rockwell Kent drew his now-celebrated logo of a "random" house, which made its debut in February 1927. Among the first titles of the new imprint were limited editions illustrated by Kent of Voltaire's CANDIDE and Melville's MOBY DICK. When the demand for luxury editions came to a halt with the stock market crash of 1929, Cerf and Klopfer turned to the publishing of general trade books. Among their earliest authors were Robinson Jeffers and Eugene O'Neill, and in 1934 they made headlines with the publication of James Joyce's ULYSSES and their defense of the book in the landmark censorship case. During the next few decades they also published some of the most distinguished writers of the twentieth century: William Faulkner, Isak Dinesen, Edgar Snow, Andre Malraux, Robert Graves, Gertrude Stein, W.H. Auden and John O'Hara. As Random House's reputation grew, so did its list of authors, including Truman Capote, Ralph Ellison, Irwin Shaw, Sinclair Lewis, Robert Penn Warren, Eudora Welty, and James Michener. In more recent years, Random House has continued to publish writers of both literary and commercial appeal such as William Styron, Gore Vidal, Maya Angelou, Carl Sagan, E. L. Doctorow, Norman Mailer, Anna Quindlen, Alice Walker, Mario Puzo, John Irving, Tracy Kidder, and Salman Rushdie. Since 1995 it has published a number of the bestselling books of all time: Colin Powell's MY AMERICAN JOURNEY, John Berendt's MIDNIGHT IN THE GARDEN OF GOOD AND EVIL, Tom Brokaw's THE GREATEST GENERATION and Laura Hillenbrand's SEABISCUIT. In the past few years it has become a showcase for first fiction and narrative nonfiction and has enjoyed particular success with Matthew Pearl's THE DANTE CLUB, Azar Nafisi's READING LOLITA IN TEHRAN, and Rob Kurson's SHADOW DIVERS. True to its founders and its name, Random House continues to publish a rich diversity of titles, adding talented new authors to its list to ensure a future that matches its distinguished past.

Ballantine Books was established in l952 by the legendary paperback pioneers Ian and Betty Ballantine. As an undergraduate at Columbia University in the l930s, Ian had written a paper extolling the future of paperbound books; together with his wife, he went on to found the reprint houses Penguin USA (1939) and Bantam Books (1945.) World War II saw the popularization of paperbacks, which were distributed to military personnel in all theatres of war, and the time was now ripe to make them more widely available. This time the Ballantines concentrated on paperback originals--books first published in paperback form rather than hardcover--and though their list spanned a variety of subjects, they found a particular specialty in science fiction, fantasy, westerns, and mystery novels. Today, Ballantine is one of America's largest publishers of hardcover, trade paperback and mass market paperback books -- spanning a remarkably wide variety of subjects. Publishing talented writers from every category and genre, its hardcover program is particularly strong in commercial fiction. Its impressive list of bestselling authors includes Suzanne Brockmann, Julie Garwood, Tess Gerritsen, Kristin Hannah, Linda Howard, Jonathan Kellerman, Lorna Landvik, Judith McNaught, Anne Perry, and Jeff Shaara. Its distinguished nonfiction list includes authors Mark Kurlansky, Harvey Mackay, Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson and Alison Weir. In the areas of health and diet Ballantine has published the extraordinarily successful SUGAR BUSTERS! by H. Leighton Steward, Morrison Bethea, M.D., Sam Andrews, M.D., and Luis Balart, M.D.; and its parenting successes include SECRETS OF THE BABY WHISPERER by Tracy Hogg and RAISING CAIN by Michael Thompson. Notable titles on its literary fiction list are Dan Chaon's YOU REMIND ME OF ME and Gail Godwin's forthcoming QUEEN OF THE UNDERWORLD.

Covering an enormous range of subjects, the Ballantine trade paperback program offers appealing books for a dierse readership -- from the works of John Updike and John Irving to the phenomenally bestselling Garfield and Peanuts books. Ballantine is especially proud of its Random House Reader's Circle program, a select line of leading paperback originals and reprints marketed specifically for reading groups. This was the first imprint to bind a discussion guide into the back of each book -- featuring author interviews, discussion questions, author biographies and excerpts from reviews. Now offering the best of both Ballantine and Random House trade paperbacks with more than 400 titles, the Random House Reader's Circle encompasses both literary and commercial fiction and nonfiction, from groundbreaking first novels to classic works of contemporary literature. In addition to longtime Random House Reader's Circle authors such as Karen Armstrong, Elizabeth Berg, Dan Chaon, Fannie Flagg, Laura Hillenbrand, Alice Hoffman, Lorna Landvik , Adriana Trigiani, Anne Tyler, and Anna Quindlen, the Reader's Circle list now also includes Sarah Dunant, Jonathan Harr, Azar Nafisi, Matthew Pearl, Arthur Phillips, Ruth Reichl, Lisa See, Curtis Sittenfeld, Amy Tan,and Amanda Eyre Ward.

The Ballantine/ Fawcett/ Ivy Mass Market imprints include such authors as Suzanne Brockmann, Lorenzo Carcaterra, Fannie Flagg, Julie Garwood, Tess Gerritsen, Laurell K. Hamilton, Kristin Hannah, Linda Howard, John Irving, Jonathan Kellerman, Richard North Patterson, Anne Perry, Anne Rice, Edward Rutherfurd, John Saul, and Margaret Truman.

Devoted to the publication of science fiction, fantasy, and other forms of speculative fiction, Del Rey was started in 1977 as a division of Ballantine Books. Its founders were the late Judy-Lynn and Lester del Rey, legendary publishers who catapulted numerous science fiction/fantasy titles onto the national bestseller lists for the first time. The imprint has published some of the bestselling books of all time in this category, including Ray Bradbury's FAHRENHEIT 451 and the mass market editions of J. R. R. Tolkien's THE HOBBIT and THE LORD OF THE RINGS. Current authors include Douglas Adams, Terry Brooks, Orson Scott Card, Arthur C. Clarke, Peter F. Hamilton, Anne McCaffrey, China Mieville, Richard K. Morgan, and Harry Turtledove. Under a comprehensive licensing agreement with Lucasfilm, Del Rey has been the premier publisher of the bestselling novelizations of all six Star Wars (R) novelizations and a plethora of other Star Wars fiction and nonfiction titles under the Del Rey/Lucasbooks imprint. In May 2004, the Del Rey Manga program launched a bestselling list of Japanese comics in translation, becoming the first trade house to enter one of the fastest-growing areas of American publishing.

The Modern Library, the most beloved line of American classics, celebrated its 75th anniversary at Random House in 2000 and has continued to thrive. In 1999 it generated spirited debate with its published lists of the 100 Best Novels and the 100 Best Nonfiction Books published in English in the 20th century. The year 2000 saw the introduction of Modern Library Chronicles, short histories by the world's great historians, including ISLAM by Karen Armstrong and THE AGE OF SHAKESPEARE by Frank Kermode. That same year the Modern Library introduced its first line of paperback classics, a list that has grown to more than 300 titles and now leads the industry in editorial quality and production values. Twenty-two leading writers and intellectuals, including A.S. Byatt, Joyce Carol Oates, Edmund Morris, Shelby Foote, and Maya Angelou, make up the Modern Library Editorial Board, which continues its unique role of providing editorial counsel to the Modern Library and its editors.



Launched in the Spring of 2007, Mortalis is a publishing program designed for readers of intelligent historical mysteries and international tales of intrigue. From diabolically gripping fiction to notorious tales of true crime, Mortalis delivers top-drawer mysteries and thrillers, including popular, established bestsellers as well as exciting original titles. Every one of these trade paperbacks will feature a dossier, tailered to each book, filled with bonus material on the book's time period, setting, plot, genre, or author: special interviews, exclusive essays, extended author biographies, and more.

In 1991, Ballantine launched One World and became the first mainstream publisher to create an imprint devoted to multi-cultural titles. Its list encompasses subjects of African-American, Asian, Latin, and Native American interest across all categories and formats. Its bestselling backlist titles include THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF MALCOLM X as told to Alex Haley and DREAMING IN CUBAN by Cristina Garcia. Current and forthcoming authors include the bestselling novelist Pearl Cleage, the black film historian Donald Bogle, and one of the rising stars of "street lit," Nikki Turner. Strivers Row, founded in 2001 to showcase African-American fiction, was named after the street in Harlem which was largely inhabited by first-generation African American professionals during the time of the Harlem Renaissance. Its authors include Parry "Ebony Satin" Brown, Tajuana Butler, Travis Hunter, and Nichelle Tramble.

The military history publisher Presidio Press was acquired by Ballantine in 2002. Its recent hardcover titles include Max Frankel's HIGH NOON IN THE COLD WAR, Thomas C. Reed's AT THE ABYSS: An Insider's History of the Cold War and THE BATTLE OF MOGADISHU, a collection of firsthand accounts from the men of Task Force Ranger. Recent paperbacks include SIX DAYS OF WAR by Michael B. Oren, THE HUNT FOR BIN LADEN by Robin Moore, and a reissue of the classic WE WERE SOLDIERS ONCE...AND YOUNG, by Lt. Gen. Harold G. Moore (Ret.) and Joseph L. Galloway.

First launched in the fall of 2001, Random House Trade Paperbacks is the paperback imprint of Random House, with an emphasis on serious non-fiction and literary fiction. The non-fiction list includes the #1 bestseller READING LOLITA IN TEHRAN by Azar Nafisi, THE CRISIS OF ISLAM by Bernard Lewis, PARIS 1919 by Margaret McMillan, and MOUNTAINS BEYOND MOUNTAINS by Tracy Kidder. E.L. Doctorow, Sarah Dunant, David Mitchell, Matthew Pearl, and Arthur Phillips are among its many award-winning fiction writers.

Villard Books, named after the Stanford White brownstone mansion on Madison Avenue that was the home of Random House for twenty years, was founded in 1983. It publishes a general nonfiction and fiction list that has positioned itself on the leading edge of popular culture. Among the bestselling authors it has published are Jon Krakauer, Eve Ensler, Governor Jesse Ventura and Peter Greenberg, the "Travel Detective." It is also known for its titles in the areas of humor, personal narrative, and new-voice fiction, including the books of Laurie Notaro and Jon Katz.