Debut novelist Shirley Benton Bailey has signed a three book deal with Poolbeg.

The first of the three books, Looking For Leon, will be published in spring 2011 and Benton Bailey is already working on her second manuscript.

The deal was brokered by relatively new agents Prizeman & Kinsella.

A very impressive result for Poolbeg with two books in the top ten, though the volumes this week are low. Claudia Carroll also makes the list and good to see a nice spread of authors represented in the chart this week.

1: House Rules, Jodi Picoult, 1,453
2: The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets’ Nest, Stieg Larsson, 1,265
3: The Whisperers, John Connolly, 1,244
4: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, Stieg Larsson, 1,221
5: The Girl Who Played with Fire, Stieg Larsson, 1,000
6: Hard Girls, Martina Cole, 681
7: Personally, I Blame My Fairy Godmother, Claudia Carroll, 655
8: The Seven Secrets of Happiness, Sharon Owens, 632
9: Casa Clara, Kate McCabe, 535
10: Genesis, Karin Slaughter, 534

Data Supplied by Nielsen BookScan taken from the Irish Consumer Market week ending 8th May 2010

Hay House, the global publishers of lifestyle and Self-help titles, has bought the world rights (excluding Ireland) to Kevin Skelton and Yvonne Kinsella’s Sent By An Angel which was published by Poolbeg in Ireland.

The book will be published in the UK in Spring 2011 and US and other editions will follow later in the year.

The deal was brokered by recently formed literary agency, Prizeman & Kinsella, and the acquiring editor was Hay House Managing director, Michelle Pilley.

Claire Allen has signed a new three book deal with Poolbeg Press. She announced the deal on her Twitter & Facebook stream.

The Derry Journal also featured the story and quoted Poolbeg publisher Paula Campbell as saying:

she is “absolutely thrilled” to have Claire on board for another three books and hopes this is just another stage in a longterm relationship between the pair.
“Good authors with the quality of Claire’s writing are hard to come by,” she said.

When you strip away the foreign based publishers and look at Publishers based in Ireland that is publishers whose books are listed at being published in Ireland on Nielsen the list of Ireland's Top ten Publishers is very interesting.

Company ~ Market Share

1) Gill & Macmillan Group ~ 14.5%
2) Edco- The Educational Company of Ireland ~ 10.5%
3) Penguin Ireland ~ 9.0%
4) Folens Publishers ~ 8.1%
5) C.J. Fallon ~ 5.3%
6) Poolbeg Press ~ 5.3%
7) Transworld Ireland ~ 4.9%
8) Hachette Ireland ~ 4.7%
9) O’Brien Press ~ 4.2%
10) Mercier Press ~ 2.6%

Although Twitter (wikipedia entry) has existed since 2006 and despite the fact that many publishers worldwide have begin to use Twitter a s tool for selling, Irish Publishers have been slow to use the communication tool as a sales or promotional platform.

To date the most active publishing tweet stream has been Irish Language publisher Cló Iar-Chonnachta, Cork based Collins Press and Belfast based Blackstaff.

However, Poolbeg Press, having joined in May 2009, started sending out several tweets last week and Liberties Press have also begin to update their twitter stream with more regularity. The History Press, Ireland (the new name for Nonsuch Ireland) also began tweeting last week following the rebranding of their imprint and the launch of their new website.

For a full list of Irish Publishers on Twitter, follow Irish Publishing News’ list on twitter.

The Girl With The Dragon Tatoo

1: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, Stieg Larsson
2: The Girl Who Played with Fire, Stieg Larsson
3: The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets’ Nest, Stieg Larsson
4: The Brightest Star in the Sky, Marian Keyes
5: Eclipse, Stephenie Meyer
6: The Lovely Bones, Alice Sebold
7: Breaking Dawn, Stephenie Meyer
8: The Man Inside the Jacket, Mr. Tayto
9: Feels Like Maybe, Claire Allan
10: The Lost Symbol, Dan Brown

SOURCE: Nielsen Bookscan, Irish Consumer Market Top 10