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July 26 – Aug 1, 2010 Edition Penguin Reports Record Sales, Profits for First Half of 2010

New York, New York/AUTHORLINK NEWS/July 26, 2010–Penguin Group, the international publishing company, today reported a 9% sales increase for the second half of 2010 and a 110% increase in profits. Sales increased to £493m and profit was up £44m, a record result.

Excluding the impact of currency, underlying results were also very strong, with sales up 7% and profit up 56%. The results reflect a strong and consistent publishing performance across imprints and territories, despite the challenging trading environment.

The record performance was reflected in market share gains in Penguin Group’s three largest markets: the U.S. grew from 11.9% to 12.4%; the UK grew from 9.9% to 10.7%; and Australia grew from 12.3% to 13.1%. The results were part of a strong overall Pearson performance.

Penguin Group Chairman and Chief Executive John Makinson said: “These are remarkable results, achieved in markets that remain very challenging both financially and strategically. Penguin’s record first half profits reflect a publishing performance that was of consistently high quality across territories, genres and formats. We are seeing real benefits from the reorganization of our UK businesses undertaken last year and from our decision to invest aggressively and early in digital content. The strength and depth of our publishing program give us confidence that this level of performance can be sustained in the second half of the year.”

Penguin Group (USA) CEO David Shanks said: “In the U.S., over the past several years, Penguin Group (USA) has consistently delivered exceptionally strong results. Not only did we beat expectations for the first half of 2010, we gained market share once again. Our profits and sales were up and our margins improved, driven by strong performances across the businesses. Our frontlist business remained healthy, the overall backlist business grew and we achieved operational efficiencies Group-wide.

“We achieved more New York Times bestsellers than ever before at the half-year mark. eBook sales were three times higher than last year, and we implemented new digital partnerships and strategies. For the fourth time in six years, we won a Pulitzer Prize. We continued to yield excellent results from our successful imprint strategy. And the Young Readers division increased sales and accomplished new levels of literary success.

“Looking ahead, we are cautiously optimistic about the market in general and very excited about the strength and diversity of our Fall list as well our backlist and eBooks categories. We have new books coming from Tom Clancy, Patricia Cornwell, Ken Follett, Barbra Streisand, Terry McMillan, Ron Chernow, and Richelle Mead, author of the #1 bestselling Vampire Academy series.”

In the First Half of 2010, Penguin Group (USA):

Led the Industry in Maximizing the Success of Multi-Million-Copy, #1 New York Times Bestselling Author Franchises Across All Formats Tripled eBook Sales, with 11,000 eBooks Now Available Won the 2010 Pulitzer Prize for History with The Penguin Press’ Lords of Finance by Liaquat Ahamed Achieved More New York Times Bestsellers Than Ever Before, and Led the Industry in Delivering the Most New York Times Hardcover Bestsellers from a Single Imprint and the Most New York Times Mass Market Bestsellers Overall Continued to Yield Excellent Results from Its Successful Imprint Strategy Dominated Hardcover and Paperback Bestseller Lists in the Paranormal Fiction Category Introduced New Digital Initiatives with the Launch of an Interactive Web-Based Community for Readers, and the Third Annual Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award, the Only Contest of Its Kind in the Industry, Which Debuted a New Young Adult Category The Young Readers Group Achieved Significant Growth, Accomplished New Levels of Literary Success, and Expanded a Popular Trade Paperback Series into the Hardcover Market Generated Widespread National Attention for the Penguin Brand, as Part of Penguin Books’ 75th Anniversary Celebration Continued to Achieve Double-Digit Growth in Both Audio and International Sales Continued to Invest in a Greener Future with the Penguin Group Global Walk, Electronic Workflow and Environmental Partnerships

Penguin Group (USA)’s multi-million selling authors, including Michael Pollan, Nora Roberts, Kathryn Stockett and Charlaine Harris, and continued to achieve tremendous success across multiple formats.

Michael Pollan achieved four New York Times bestsellers in one week (January 31), with Food Rules (Penguin) #1 on the paperback advice, how-to, and miscellaneous list (more than 721,000 copies in print through ten printings); In Defense of Food (Penguin) #1 on The New York Times trade paperback bestseller list (more than 441,000 copies in print through eight printings); The Omnivore’s Dilemma (Penguin) #1 on The New York Times trade paperback bestseller list (a New York Times bestseller for more than two and a half years, with nearly 1.1 million copies in print, through sixteen printings); and The Omnivore’s Dilemma for Kids (Dial Books for Young Readers), on the children’s picture book list. Pollan was also featured in the Thinkers section of Time magazine’s annual Time 100 issue, which acknowledges the people that Time’s editors feel most affect the world. Time states that Pollan “thinks about the ethical bonds that connect our bodies, farms and food. In so doing, he has become an example to the rest of us.”

Nora Roberts achieved seven New York Times bestsellers, including three #1 New York Times bestsellers, across all formats, in the first half of the year. Roberts’ Savor the Moment debuted at #1 on the trade paperback fiction list and represents the third book in her Bride Quartet, her first trade paperback original series. There are more than 3 million copies in print of the first three books in the series, with the fourth book, Happy Ever After, to be published by Berkley on November 2. Roberts’ newest hardcover, The Search, was published by G. P. Putnam’s Sons on July 7 and debuted at #1 on The New York Times hardcover fiction bestseller list.

The Help by Kathryn Stockett, a #1 New York Times bestseller and USA Today’s 2009 Book of the Year, continued its tremendous sales velocity in the first half of this year. The Help (Amy Einhorn Books/ G. P. Putnam’s Sons) has now been on The New York Times hardcover fiction bestseller list for 68 weeks and received the 2010 Indies Choice Book Award for Adult Debut at this year’s Book Expo America.

Charlaine Harris’ Dead in the Family (Ace) debuted at # 1 on The New York Times hardcover fiction bestseller list (800,000 copies shipped) and is the tenth book in her phenomenally popular Sookie Stackhouse series, with more than 16.7 million copies of the titles shipped to date.

Penguin Group (USA) eBook sales were three times higher, year over year, in the first half of 2010, with 11,000 titles available at the half-year mark. Among Penguin Group (USA)’s bestselling eBook titles so far in 2010 were Caught by Harlan Coben, The Help by Kathryn Stockett, and Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert.

Penguin Group partnered with Apple on the launch of their iBookstore and iPad in April, with the iPad featuring Winnie-the-Pooh by A.A. Milne, published by Penguin Young Readers Group, the first and only book preloaded onto the device. As the digital market has evolved, Penguin has supported all eReading devices in order to bring books to readers in whatever format they prefer.

Looking ahead to the second half of 2010, Penguin’s lineup features #1 New York Times-bestselling and National Book Award-winning authors to international stars, the prestigious range of titles Penguin Group (USA) Among them are:

Fiction:
Tom Clancy, Dead or Alive (Putnam, December)
Tom Clancy, #1 international bestselling author, bestselling videogame presenter, and one of the preeminent and most prescient storytellers of our time, has written a modern-day techno-thriller like nothing he has written before. For the first time ever, Clancy brings together twenty-six years of unforgettable characters, including Jack Ryan, Jack Ryan Jr., John Clark, Ding Chavez, and Mary Pat Foley, to jointly face their greatest challenge yet: modern-day terrorism. Clancy’s new novel was written in collaboration with U.S. Navy veteran Grant Blackwood.

Patricia Cornwell, Port Mortuary (Putnam, November)
In the eighteenth Kay Scarpetta novel from the world’s #1 bestselling crime writer, a treacherous path from Scarpetta’s past merges with the high-tech highway she now finds herself on, as Scarpetta is confronted with a case that could shut down her new facility and ruin her personally and professionally.

Ken Follett, Fall of Giants (Dutton, September)
A Fall of Giants is the magnificent new historical epic from the #1 international bestselling author Ken Follett. The first novel in the Century Trilogy, it follows the fates of five interrelated families—American, German, Russian, English, and Welsh.

Terry McMillan, Getting to Happy (Viking, September)
From the #1 New York Times–bestselling author, the sequel to her groundbreaking novel, and hit movie, Waiting to Exhale. This exuberant return of the unforgettable heroines Savannah, Gloria, Bernadine, and Robin finds them facing middle age, and reclaiming their dreams.

Nora Roberts, The Search (Putnam, July)
The #1 New York Times-bestselling author presents a riveting novel of romantic suspense in which a canine search-and-rescue volunteer fights danger. With her latest novel, Roberts once again proves why The New Yorker recently described her as “America’s favorite writer.”

Clive Cussler and Dirk Cussler, Crescent Dawn (Putnam, November)
The new Dirk Pitt adventure from the #1 New York Times-bestselling authors. NUMA director Dirk Pitt and his children investigate the connection among explosive events in A.D. 327, 1916, and the present day.

Jan Karon, In the Company of Others: A Father Tim Novel (Viking, October)
This second novel in the bestselling Father Tim series from the award-winning, New York Times bestselling author, is a stirring page turner set in Ireland.

John le Carré, Our Kind of Traitor (Viking, October)
The master of spy fiction returns with a taut and suspenseful tale of dirty money and dirtier politics, about a couple who finds themselves pawns in a deadly endgame, its outcome to be determined by the victor of the British Secret Service’s ruthless internecine battles.

Daniel Silva, The Rembrandt Affair (Putnam, July)
The sweeping and spellbinding thriller from the #1 New York Times bestselling author is Silva’s most extraordinary novel to date—a tale of greed, passion, and murder spanning more than half a century, centered on an object of haunting beauty.

Christine Feehan, Dark Peril (Berkley, August)
The follow-up to last year’s #1 New York Times-bestselling Dark Slayer. In the latest in the Dark series, about the Carpathians, an ancient race of shapeshifters and vampires, Feehan brings together two warriors who have lived their lives alone, but at the end of time find each other.

Around the globe, Penguin Group delivered a very strong performance in its major markets, including the UK, where Penguin had 27 top ten bestsellers and six #1 bestsellers, including Jane Green’s Girl Friday, Clive Cussler’s The Spy, Jamie Oliver’s Jamie Does, which was the UK industry’s best-selling nonfiction title in the first half, and Rupert Isaacson’s The Horse Boy in paperback. The Penguin UK Children’s division also had a stellar first half, increasing its market share from 10.8% to 13.3%. In its 70th anniversary year, Puffin sales grew by 35% driven by phenomenal sales for the Percy Jackson and Wimpy Kid series, while Ladybird grew by 16%.

In spite of continuing tough conditions in illustrated reference publishing, DK made a very strong start to 2010, outperforming the market in both the UK and the U.S. DK’s partnership with Lego has been particularly successful. The Lego Star Wars Visual Dictionary has spent the whole of 2010 on The New York Times bestseller list with 11 weeks at #1. In the UK, DK had a #1 hit with The Masterchef Cookbook, its top adult title worldwide in the first six months of 2010.

Looking ahead, next month Penguin will launch its world-famous Penguin Classics in Portuguese in Brazil through a partnership with Companhia das Letras, one of the most prestigious publishing houses in Brazil, and in September the Allen Lane imprint will launch in Canada.

Penguin Group (www.penguin.com), one of the world’s largest English-language trade book publishers, has established divisions and key market positions in the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia, Canada, India, China, South Africa, New Zealand, and Ireland. The Penguin Group is part of Pearson plc, the international media company.