thebookseller.com WEDNESDAY 13 04.2016 At the London Book Fair NEWS
Bonnier’s Pocket Shop bookshop to enter UK market imminently
BY LISA CAMPBELL
Northern European bookshop chain Pocket Shop hopes to open its first UK store before the summer, The Bookseller Daily can reveal. Anna Borné Minberger, c.e.o. of the chain, which is owned by Swedish media giant Bonnier, said the company was in negotiations to secure premises in three locations in the UK, with one contract on the verge of being signed. While she declined to reveal the exact location of the company’s British début, she said “at least one” store should be open “before summer”. “Things are moving forward,”
Minberger said. “We have visited quite a number of locations in the past couple of months and get presented new locations almost every week . . . At this point we have one handshake and two very interesting locations that we are negotiating. At least one of these should open before summer.” In terms of the company’s aims for a UK footprint, Minberger
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added: “It is of course
more important for us to find the right location, rather than [committing ourselves to] opening a certain number of shops per year.” The Bookseller first reported
that Pocket Shop was eyeing a UK launch last November. At the time, Minberger said: “We are looking at several markets at this time, but haven’t yet made up our minds about where and when. The UK market is extremely competitive.” Paperback chain Pocket Shop
was founded in 1989 by Mathias Engdahl. Bonnier bought it in 2012, with Minberger succeeding Engdahl as c.e.o. in 2013. There are around 25 Pocket Shop outlets across Sweden, Germany and Finland, all based in travel hubs such as airports and major train stations. The UK launch is in line with
the recent expansion of Bonnier’s UK-based activities; its English- language publishing division, Bonnier Publishing, has grown rapidly and claims to be the fourth- largest publisher in the UK.
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PLUS GLOBAL CHARTS HORACE BENT
Hutchinson secures Raqqa Diaries, detailing life under ISIS rule EXCLUSIVE NEWS
Hutchinson is to publish The Raqqa Diaries: Life Inside the Islamic State by Syrian activist Mohammed. The publisher will not disclose the author’s surname in order to protect his identity. The book grew out of a series of short broadcasts on BBC Radio
4’s “Today” programme, based on the diaries of a young man who is “willing to risk his life” to tell the world what is happening in the Syrian city of Raqqa. “Now one of the most isolated and fear-ridden cities on Earth,” Hutchinson says. None of Raqqa’s inhabitants are allowed to speak to Western journalists or leave the city without the permission of Islamic State—and those who break ISIS’ rules risk being beheaded.
The diaries were encrypted and sent to an itermediate country before being translated into English. Jocasta Hamilton, publishing director at Hutchinson, acquired world rights directly from the author. Hamilton said: “I was so struck by the power of this first-person voice. We know that the ISIS regime is brutal but this brought home just how horrendous and capricious its rule is. Raw, direct and profoundly affecting, this will be an important book that will grant us unprecedented access to the conditions many Syrians are living under.” Hutchinson will publish in small-format hardback, with illustrations, later this year.
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