Harper Expands Spanish-Language Publishing, Licenses Lee's Watchman

Publishers Lunch

In the vein of their new Harper Germany publishing line, HarperCollins has created Harper Iberica to publish in Spain and Portugal, and Harper Espanol to publish Spanish-language books in North and South America. Larry Downs is svp and publisher for Harper Espanol, which will publish approximately 50 books a year, and Luis Pugni is managing director of Harper Iberica, which aims to publish approximately 30 titles. To lead the initiatives, Harper has acquired world Spanish rights in all formats to Harper Lee's forthcoming Go Set a Watchman, and it has picked up print and audio rights for To Kill a Mockingbird.

CEO Brian Murray says in the announcement, "This was the natural next step in the evolution of our foreign language publishing program. There is tremendous opportunity in the Spanish-language market around the world. By using the existing teams, we are able to hit the ground running to further extend the reach of our authors."

The Spanish lists will feature regional authors as well as existing HarperCollins authors, including Daniel Silva (as announced last October), along with the recently-announced Jorge Posada book as well as American Sniper by Chris Kyle, One Minute Manager by Ken Blanchard, The Pursuit of Happyness by Chris Gardner, and Prayer is Good Medicine by Larry Dossey.