2024 Speaker Bios

Andrew Richard Albanese is Executive Editor at Publishers Weekly. He is author of The Battle of $9.99: How Apple, Amazon and the Big Six Publishers Changed the E-Book Business Overnight.

Marlon Alvarado is Director of Talent Acquisition at Scholastic. He leads enterprise-wide recruiting for Scholastic with strategic and operational oversight over sourcing, recruiting operations, selection, executive hiring, internship programs, and Talent Data insights. Prior to Scholastic, Marlon served as Director Global Talent at Penguin Random House and Head of Talent Acquisition at JetBlue. He attended Columbia University and Florida State University.

Jon Anderson has headed the Simon & Schuster Children’s Publishing Division since January 2009.

Mr. Anderson is responsible for the overall operations for the Children’s Division including editorial, design, production, publicity, marketing and licensing activities, while overseeing a publishing portfolio that serves every category of the children’s publishing business from toddlers to teens, while maintaining an extensive backlist that includes numerous Newbery, Caldecott and National Book Award winners.

Prior to joining Simon & Schuster, Mr. Anderson was the President and Publisher of Running Press Book Publishers, a division of Perseus Books Group.  Before that, Mr. Anderson was at Penguin Putnam, Inc., where he was Vice President and Publisher of Price Stern Sloan and Penguin’s DreamWorks publishing program. Prior to Penguin, Mr. Anderson spent seventeen years at B. Dalton Booksellers/Barnes & Noble in positions ranging from sales clerk while in high school to head of the chain’s childrens’ buying division.

Mr. Anderson is an active member of the children’s book publishing community, and serves on the board of the National Coalition Against Censorship. He is also the author of many children’s books under the pseudonym William Boniface, with cumulative sales of more than two million copies.  He lives in Connecticut.

Kimberly Ayers Shariff is Executive Vice President, Strategy for Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion, Penguin Random House U.S., and a member of the Penguin Random House U.S. Board. She leads the creation, maintenance, and implementation of Penguin Random House’s companywide DEI Strategic Plan, helping to ensure the creation of books for everyone, by everyone, out of a culture where all feel welcome and empowered to fully participate in the process. Previously, shariff was Chief Administrative Officer at American Ballet Theatre and Deputy General Counsel at Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts; she began her career at Black Entertainment Television. She attended Georgetown University and holds a law degree from Tulane University School of Law.

Carrie Bloxson joined Hachette Book Group in February 2021. Carrie oversees HBG’s diversity and inclusion programs and strategy with the objective of creating a more diverse, inclusive, and equitable company with increased representation of people of color in HBG’s leadership, workplaces, and publishing programs.

Bloxson was previously interim CEO and Chief Marketing Officer at DoSomething.org, the largest social impact organization for young people in the world. Under her leadership, DoSomething received numerous social impact awards. She was also named a Top Women in PR Honoree for Social Impact in 2020 from PR Newswire.

Earlier, she was Vice President of Marketing at HarperCollins for six years and launched a variety of audience development campaigns that contributed to multiple bestselling titles. Carrie is a co-founder of CMOs for Good, an organization of marketing leaders who oversee social impact.

Andrea Colvin is Editorial Director of Little, Brown Ink, the graphic novel imprint of Little, Brown Books for Young Readers, where she has published such well-received graphic novels as Just Pretend by Tori Sharp; Shark Summer and Spirit Week by Ira Marcks; Numb to This: Memoir of a Mass Shooting by Kindra Neely; Muhamad Najem, War Reporter by Muhammad Najem and Nora Neus, illustrated by Julie Robine; and the debut graphic novel from actor/athlete/activist Terry Crews, with Cory Thomas: Terry’s Crew.

Before coming to Little, Brown, Andrea was editor-in-chief of the independent comics publisher Lion Forge, where she published Gender Queer: A Memoir by Maia Kobabe; Mooncakes by Suzanne Walker and Wendy Xu; No Ivy League by Hazel Newlevant; Upgrade Soul by Ezra Claytan Daniels; and the Amazon Graphic Novel of the Year for 2017, Lighter Than My Shadow by Katie Green.

James Daunt is Chief Executive Officer of Barnes & Noble, the world’s largest retail bookseller, of stationery and gift retailer Paper Source and of Waterstones, the largest retail bookseller in the United Kingdom. He currently oversees approximately 600 Barnes & Noble bookstores and 125 Paper Source in the United States and over 300 bookshops across the United Kingdom, Ireland, The Netherlands and Belgium, which include Waterstones, Blackwell’s, Foyles, and Hatchards. Daunt has over 30 years of experience in bookselling. After eschewing an early career as an investment banker, he opened his own bookstore in London in 1990, called (unimaginatively) Daunt Books. Daunt Books now has nine locations, mainly in London, and remains independently owned by Daunt. In 2011, he was appointed Managing Director of Waterstones when businessman Alexander Mamut bought the struggling bookseller. Waterstones was subsequently restored to profitability, a success that led to the acquisition of a majority stake in the business by Elliott Advisors in July 2018. Elliott acquired Barnes & Noble in August 2019 and Barnes & Noble purchased Paper Source in May 2021. Besides his successes in bookselling, Daunt was elected as an Honorary Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature in 2017 and appointed a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in the 2022 Queen’s Birthday Honours for services to the publishing industry. He is a graduate of Pembroke College at the University of Cambridge, where he studied history. Daunt is married and has two daughters.

Scott Dickey is an industry leading CEO across media, consumer products, event entertainment and sports, operating in both the private equity and public sectors.

In 2019,  he partnered with Presidio Investors to take the helm as the CEO of Podium Audio, a leading  digital-first publisher. With a focus on genre fiction, Podium has become a leader in Science  Fiction, Fantasy, and Romance, bringing the popular sub-genres of Gamelit, LitRPG, Progression Fantasy, and more to the forefront.  Podium Audio is also the owner of Bookstat, a data subscription service.

Prior to Podium, from 2014-2018 Dickey was the CEO of TEN: The Enthusiast Network. Prior to joining TEN, from 2008-2013, Dickey was the President & CEO of Competitor Group, where he  was instrumental in leading the development of the company’s media business. Earlier in his career Scott has held additional top positions at Transworld Media, Fotoball USA Inc., the Walt Disney Company and the National Basketball Association.

Sanyu Dillon was promoted to President, Random House Publishing Group in February 2023, overseeing imprints Random House, The Dial Press, Hogarth, The Modern Library, One World, Ballantine Bantam Dell/Delacorte, Random House Worlds, Harmony/Rodale, Convergent, and WaterBrook & Multnomah. With this role, she returns to her roots, having begun her PRH career at Random House in 2004 as Director of Marketing for the Random House imprint. For the next 14 years, Dillon held successive marketing roles, bringing an empathetic approach to marketing, centered on a deep understanding of the evolving needs of readers. In 2018, she moved to corporate marketing, and she became Chief Marketing Officer in 2020, where she helped the company connect with its readers through dynamic storytelling and breakthrough campaigns. An incisive and inclusive leader, Dillon brings to Random House future-oriented thinking, and a deep passion for creative storytelling. She is a member of the Penguin Random House U.S. Board and has an Executive MBA from NYU Stern School of Business.

Ryan Doherty is Vice President, Editorial Director at Celadon Books, Macmillan. He publishes journalistic narrative nonfiction (pop culture, true crime, big think, biography, sports) and upmarket suspense. At Celadon, Doherty has edited the New York Times bestsellers The Silent Patient and The Maidens by Alex Michaelides, Unmasked by Paul Holes, The Whisper Man by Alex North,as well as the Edgar award-winning Last Call by Elon Green and You’re Not Listening by Kate Murphy, among others. Prior to joining Macmillan, he was the Vice President of literary development for Sony Pictures Entertainment, focusing on book to film and television development. Before that, Doherty was a senior editor at Ballantine Books.

Kristin Fassler is the Senior Vice President and Director of Integrated Marketing Strategy for the Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group at Penguin Random House, where she oversees the creation and implementation of the consumer marketing, branding, and social strategies for over 300 fiction and nonfiction titles annually. She has worked on campaigns for bestselling authors including John Grisham, Michelle Zauner, Diana Gabaldon, Julia Child, Fredrik Backman, Toni Morrison, Margaret Atwood, and George R. R. Martin. Fassler previously served as Vice President and Director of Marketing and Publicity at Simon & Schuster.

Andrea Fleck-Nisbet is CEO of the Independent Book Publishers Association. Before joining IBPA, she was the founding vice president and publisher at Harper Horizon, a nonfiction imprint of HarperCollins. Prior to that, she was the director of content acquisition for Ingram Content Group, where she developed initiatives that supported independent publishers of all sizes.t. Andrea spent her first 15 years in the publishing industry at Workman Publishing, leading teams in special markets, sales, and digital marketing.

Jonathan Friedman, PhD, is the director of free expression and education programs at the literary and human rights nonprofit PEN America. He oversees PEN's research, advocacy, and education related to academic freedom, book bans, and free expression. He regularly provides commentary for news media about educational censorship, and has published op-eds for CNN, The Washington Post, The Hill, The Daily Beast, New York Daily News, and Inside Higher Ed.

Andy Hunter is the founder and CEO of Bookshop.org, an ecommerce platform launched in January 2020 to support independent bookstores and provide socially conscious readers with an alternative to Amazon.

Since its launch, Bookshop.org has raised more than $29 million for independent bookstores and was certified as a “Best for the World” company, in the top 5% of B-Corp’s worldwide.

Hunter is also the co-creator and publisher of the websites Literary Hub, Crime Reads, and Bookmarks, as well as the cofounder and chairman of Electric Literature. He was previously publisher at Catapult, Counterpoint, and Soft Skull press.

Among the many recognitions for Hunter’s work keeping literature a vital part of our culture in the digital age are the 2011 Innovations in Reading Prize from the National Book Foundation, and the 2021 BISG Industry Innovator Award.

Emi Ikkanda is an Executive Editor at Tiny Reparations Books, Dutton, and Plume at Penguin Random House. She previously worked at Seal Press at Hachette, Spiegel & Grau at Random House, and Henry Holt at Macmillan. She publishes a diverse list of award-winning, bestselling, and culturally relevant books. Over the years she has edited #1 New York Times and international bestselling authors, and edited winners or finalists for the Pulitzer Prize, National Book Award, Carnegie Medal, Financial Times Business Book of the Year Award, and the TIME 100.

Andrew Jacobs is Assistant General Counsel at HarperCollins Publishers, where he conducts pre-publication review of nonfiction manuscripts, manages company litigation, serves as lead counsel for HarperCollins Children’s Books, and negotiates contracts for the company’s Digital Business Development team. Before joining HarperCollins, Andrew was Senior Counsel, Litigation at NBCUniversal Media, where he handled copyright, defamation, and other media and entertainment disputes. Prior to that, he worked in private practice as a litigation associate at Frankfurt Kurnit Klein & Selz and Cahill Gordon & Reindel. Andrew graduated magna cum laude from Harvard Law School and Brown University.

Alex Kapitan (no pronouns) has made a career out of helping people align their words with their values. Founder of the language project Radical Copyeditor, Alex draws on two decades of experience in the publishing field and in national-level activism and community organizing to support editors, writers, educators, cultural workers, healthcare providers, media makers, and many others in understanding and utilizing the power of language to counter oppression and to create positive change in the world. Alex is sought out as a speaker, trainer, and consultant, and has worked with companies as diverse as Netflix; Getty; Farrar, Straus and Giroux; Kirkus; the Center for American Progress; Editors Canada; Pearson; and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. Alex lives in western Massachusetts.

Sophie Kaplan is Sr. Director of Creative Acquisitions and IP Management for Universal Studio Group (USG), the umbrella brand that houses NBCUniversal’s four powerhouse television studios. She reports directly to Jordan Moblo, Executive Vice President, Creative Acquisitions and IP Management, USG. In this role, Kaplan is responsible for sourcing and acquiring content for Universal Television, UCP, Universal International Studios and Universal Television Alternative Studio. She manages day-to-day book and IP acquisitions that align with USG’s content strategy for scripted and unscripted television series across broadcast, cable and streaming platforms. She also works directly with each studio’s development teams and producer deals in order to help put together the most compelling packages possible.

Before joining USG, Kaplan was Director of Development at 3000 Pictures, a joint venture between Sony Pictures Entertainment and HarperCollins, developing film and television content across a variety of platforms. She began her career as a book scout at Maria Campbell Associates, where she sourced literary material for the Warner Bros. film and television studios as well as New Line Cinema.

Jonathan Karp was named President and CEO of Simon & Schuster, Inc. in May 2020. In this role, he is responsible for all the publishing and operations of Simon & Schuster’s numerous publishing divisions and its international companies in Australia, Canada, India and the United Kingdom.

Mr. Karp first joined Simon & Schuster in June 2010 as publisher of the company’s flagship imprint. Publication highlights include Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson, What Happened by Hillary Clinton, Fear by Bob Woodward, Frederick Douglass by David Blight (winner of the 2019 Pulitzer Prize in History), Born to Run by Bruce Springsteen, In One Person by John Irving, The Library Book by Susan Orlean, Is This Anything? by Jerry Seinfeld, and the launch of Mobituaries by Mo Rocca, an acclaimed book and podcast co-produced with CBS Sunday Morning.

In 2018, Mr. Karp was named President and Publisher of Simon & Schuster Adult Publishing, encompassing the company’s New York–based adult trade publishing groups: Atria Books, Gallery Books, Scribner, and Simon & Schuster. Under his leadership, the adult group launched a successful new imprint, Avid Reader Press, and established the Simon & Schuster Speakers Bureau.

Prior to joining Simon & Schuster, Mr. Karp was Publisher and Editor in Chief of Twelve, an imprint of the Hachette Book Group, which he founded in 2005. Before that, Mr. Karp was Editor in Chief of Random House, where he began his publishing career in 1989.

Mr. Karp serves on the Board of Directors of the Association of American Publishers. He earned his Bachelor of Arts degree from Brown University and his Master of Arts degree from New York University. He is also a Member of the Board of Advisors of the NYU Center for Publishing and Applied Liberal Arts.

Stephen J. McConnell is a digital technology researcher and writer. His research focuses on human interactions with AI, with a critical area to examine being how we can flourish during exchanges with these tools so we can enhance our agency, productivity, and well-being. He earned a Ph.D. in Public Communication and Technology from Colorado State University. Following his journalism career, he founded a digital marketing company, Guiding Type, and was the marketing director for Conundrum Press. At NYU SPS, he teaches writing and communication courses, including Communications & AI: An Essential Guide.

Madeline McIntosh is a digital pioneer and publishing executive with decades of experience leading organizational transformations. In March 2023, she stepped down after five years as CEO of Penguin Random House US. McIntosh played seminal roles in each of the major book market inflection points of the past three decades, including the birth of ecommerce, digital audio, and ebooks. At Amazon, she led the international content rollout of the Kindle.  At PRH, as COO, she led the integration of Penguin and Random House following the formation of the company in 2013. She has led teams in publishing, strategy, technology, sales, and operations. A profile of McIntosh in The New York Times described her as someone who “who at every turn has rejected conventional thinking, and who has had an uncanny degree of foresight about technological change.” Her leadership has been celebrated by Forbes (2021 “50 Over 50: Vision” list), Girls Write Now (2021 “Agent of Change” award), and the UJA (2022 Publishing Titan Award). McIntosh, who was referred to internally at PRH as “our reader-in-chief,”  is known for her vibrant connections with employees, authors, agents and booksellers; for an industry-leading approach to championing DEI; and for her belief in the critical importance of nurturing creative talent during the age of the algorithm and, now, of AI.

Jesse Murray is the Vice President, Content Development for Tapas Entertainment. In his role, he is responsible for producing and sourcing webnovels that appear on sister apps, Tapas and Radish. Before coming to Tapas, Jesse spent ten years at NBC Universal, where he was Vice President, Content Strategy and Editorial. He focused on SYFY and its culture vertical, SYFY WIRE. Jesse began his career at Disney/ABC, where he served as the lead for ABC Daytime’s digital presence, including General Hospital, All My Children, The Chew, and The View. Prior to that, he was Manager of Daytime Programming and Talent Development for ABC Daytime, which included finding and developing new behind the scenes talent for the division’s lineup.

Lauren O’Connor joined Amazon Studios in 2016, and launched and built their IP department from the ground up. As the Head of IP & Literary Acquisitions, she leads a team that sources and acquires books, video games, graphic novels, and audio-content for film & TV adaptation globally, supports greenlight decision making, and the company’s vast library of owned IP.

During her 7 year tenure, Amazon Studios has seen tremendous successes across adaptations, including action franchises like Jack Reacher and Jack Ryan; IP like the graphic-novel based The Boys, and recently greenlit Butterfly; genre series like Wheel of Time, and The Power; best-selling YA adaptations like Summer I Turned Pretty and the upcoming film, Red White and Royal Blue; dramas like Daisy Jones & The Six, the NYT-column based Modern Love, Bosch, The Underground Railroad, The Tender Bar, Beautiful Boy, and The Goldfinch; as well as major video-game adaptations like the upcoming Fallout, Mass Effect, and God of War.

Prior to working at Amazon, Lauren oversaw the book-to-screen department at The Weinstein Company, after making her start at Marcy Drogin’s scouting firm, Maximum Films & Management.

Zibby Owens is an author, publisher, award-winning podcaster, CEO, bookstore owner, and mom of four. Creator and host of the award-winning, daily podcast Moms Don’t Have Time to Read Books, Zibby is also the founder and CEO of Zibby Media, dubbed “the Zibby-verse” by the L.A. Times. It includes a publishing house, magazine, podcast network, retreats, classes, Zibby’s Book Club, and Zibby’s Bookshop, an independent bookstore in Santa Monica, CA. A regular contributor to “Good Morning America” and other outlets, she loves recommending books as “NYC’s Most Powerful Book-fluencer” (Vulture).

A writer herself, Zibby has published a memoir, Bookends: A Memoir of Love, Loss, and Literature, a children’s book Princess Charming, two anthologies, and a zillion essays. Her debut novel Blank comes out in March 2024.

Karine Pansa is the Co-owner, Managing Partner, and Publishing Director at Girassol Brasil - a leading children’s books publishing house established in São Paulo, Brazil. She has been in the publishing industry for almost 28 years now and is the former President of the Brazilian Book Chamber (CBL). Currently, Pansa has just been re-elected for the Board of Directors for International Projects at CBL, aimed at developing a strong international presence for the Brazilian book industry, with the objective of promoting Brazilian authors and literature globally. Since January of this year, she has been President-Elect at the International Publishers Association (IPA), the world's largest federation of national, regional and specialist publishers' associations and an NGO that promotes and defends freedom to publish, a fundamental aspect of the human right to freedom of expression. IPA also stands for the promotion of literacy and reading.

Katherine Pelz is an Acquisitions Editor at 8th Note Press with a background in both traditional and digital publishing. She has been working with authors and their stories since 2009, first in editorial at Berkley (Penguin Random House) and later in both editorial and IP creation at the serialized fiction app Radish. At 8th Note Press, she acquires romance and young adult fiction, working with debut, hybrid, and established authors interested in reaching the Millennial and Gen-Z audiences in the social media space.

Mary Pender is an agent in Media Rights at United Talent Agency, based in New York. Previously, she was a scout for 10 years, working at Maria B. Campbell Associates, where she scouted for several international publishers, as well as Warner Brothers, New Line, WBTV, and Horizon. Mary began her career as a journalist. She represents authors across all genres from picture books to serious non-fiction. Some of Mary’s clients include New York Times Bestselling authors: Angie Thomas (The Hate U Give and her new middle grade series Nic Blake And The Remarkables), Emily Henry, ("Happy Place), Dhonielle Clayton and her packaging company Cake Literary (Blackout), and Casey McQuiston (Red White & Royal Blue, which premiered on Amazon in August). A few projects she has set up for film and tv include The Hate U Give; On the Come Up; Unpregnant; Red, White, and Royal Blue; Our Chemical Hearts; and People We Meet on Vacation.

David Pogue was the New York Times weekly tech columnist from 2000 to 2013. He’s a six-time Emmy winner for his stories on CBS Sunday Morning, a New York Times bestselling author, a five-time TED speaker, host of 20 NOVA science specials on PBS, creator/host of the CBS News/Simon & Schuster podcast Unsung Science, and has written or co written more than 120 books.

Dominique Raccah is the entrepreneurial Publisher and CEO of Sourcebooks, the company she founded from her home in 1987. Originally a source of financial information for bankers, Dominique has led a continuously growing, pioneering general book publishing house that happily produces everything from adult and teen fiction, romance, thrillers, mysteries, top titles in children’s books, baby names, college guides, calendars, and more. Sourcebooks proudly publishes an array of new, thought-provoking, and  diverse voices, and is committed to its mission to change lives through books.

The largest women-led book publisher in North America, Sourcebooks today has over 200 employees and has created hundreds of national and New York Times bestsellers across genres.

Lina Renzina leads Lifestyle & Education Media Partnerships in North America at TikTok, helping lifestyle and education media publishers with organic content strategy and optimizing their presence on the platform. She also serves on the board of TikTok's PRIDE ERG. Prior to that, Lina led and built Creators for Good, the Ad Council’s talent partnerships arm, creating strategic growth through talent, creators, and entertainment IP for the organization's national purpose-driven campaigns such as suicide prevention, breast cancer risk awareness, and diversity and inclusion. She began her career in the theater industry at ICM Partners.

Nicole Resciniti is the Consultant and Content Manager for Crazy Maple Studio, Inc., a mobile tech company centered in Sunnyvale, CA. Crazy Maple Studio is a leader in mobile tech for such interactive games as Chapters: Interactive Stories, Spotlight!, and Spellbound, as well as for Reel Shorts, the movie-based streaming service, and Kiss: Read and Write Romance, a serialized reading app.

Nicole focuses on the intersection of literature and tech, and how storytellers can expand their audience via mobile technology. Owner of The Seymour Agency, Nicole has a background in Behavioral Neuroscience.

Chantal Restivo-Alessi is Chief Digital Officer and CEO International Foreign Language for HarperCollins Publishers. She works with each division around the world to manage commercial relationships with new and existing digital partners, grow digital revenues, and oversee the company’s developing foreign language publishing program. She is also a member of the company’s executive committee.

Since joining HarperCollins, Restivo-Alessi has pioneered the use of new digital sales channels, signing numerous deals with new distributors, such as subscription services Scribd and Storytel, and growing digital sales exponentially (175%). In addition, she led the launch of the company’s e-commerce platform on HC.com and has spearheaded efforts for the company’s other direct-to-consumer programs across the globe.

As CEO, International Foreign Language, Restivo-Alessi has led the development of the company’s global publishing program, with the acquisition of globally bestselling authors such as Karin Slaughter, Daniel Silva and Don Winslow, and the establishment of trade publishing operations in nine foreign markets, including Japan, Brazil, and across Europe.
Restivo-Alessi joined HarperCollins from ING Bank in London, where she was Head of Media Corporate Finance. In addition, she has worked at Aegis Group PLC in senior strategy and operational roles, EMI music, and Booz & Company.

Restivo-Alessi is fluent in six languages, holds an MBA from Columbia University, a Masters in Foreign Trade and International Marketing from ICE Italian Institute, and a Laurea (MA) in International Political Sciences from University of Rome.

Yolanda Scott is VP, Publisher & Editorial Director at Charlesbridge, where she has edited approximately 250 titles since 1995. After graduating from Harvard with a degree in Slavic languages and literature, she was turned down by the CIA for a job as an analyst. A desperate search for employment led her to stumble upon children's publishing, and she never looked back. In addition to managing the editorial and design teams, she oversees the foreign rights acquisitions program and recently managed the acquisition of a new middle-grade imprint. She is adjunct faculty at the Center for the Study of Children’s Literature at Simmons University; former board chair of the Children’s Book Council, where she also served on the CBC Diversity Committee; a nonfiction writing mentor for We Need Diverse Books; a member of the Society of Printers, and a 2016 Publishers Weekly Star Watch Top 40 Honoree. 

David Steinberger is Chairman and CEO of Open Road Integrated Media inc., and serves as Chairman of the National Book Foundation, presenter of the National Book Awards.

David led an investor group in acquiring Open Road, which is the publishing industry’s leader in utilizing technology to enable books to be discovered by readers.

Prior to Open Road, David co-led the group that acquired Arcadia Publishing, the nation’s leading publisher of local books. He then served as CEO of Arcadia Publishing.

Prior to Arcadia, David was CEO of the Perseus Books Group which was named “Publisher of the Year” by PW which described the company as “arguably the most important independent publisher in the nation.” During David’s tenure, Perseus published numerous award-winning and bestselling titles including Friday Night Lights by Buzz Bissinger, as well as titles by Richard Feynman, winner of the Nobel Prize in Physics, and Muhammad Yunus, winner of the Nobel Peace Prize.

Prior to Perseus, David was at HarperCollins Publishers, where he served as President, Adult Trade and President, Corporate Strategy and International.

Earlier in his career, David was a management consultant for Booz Allen Hamilton.  David started his career working for the City of New York, where as Deputy Commissioner for Bridges, he played a role addressing the city’s bridge crisis.

Annie Stone has been working with authors and publishers for more than a decade, both developing great content and connecting books with audiences. Currently, Annie is an Acquisitions Director at Podium Publishing, where she acquires for both the audio and all-formats programs across a range of fiction and non-fiction genres. Prior to joining Podium, Annie was Director of Content Acquisitions for YONDER, a serial fiction mobile reading app launched by the teams that created WEBTOON and Wattpad. Before working at YONDER, Annie was the Head of Business Development at BookBub, where her team helped authors and publishers all over the world leverage BookBub's marketing platform to reach new readers and find more fans. Annie has also worked as an editor of fiction for adults and young people at several major publishers, including Harlequin and HarperCollins.

Dan Stone is Executive Manager of Writer A&D at Substack. He works with the top writers on the platform across a number of culture categories. Stone also has his own Substack and podcast called Hey Pop. Prior to his role at Substack, Stone wrote books, edited magazines, worked for seven years at the National Endowment for the Arts, and served as a teacher. He owns a bar and bookstore in Oakland, California.

Joshua Stone is Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder of Book.io. He has been in the technology sector for the last 25 years. In 1999 Stone helped create Fandango.com for Cinemark. He previously led the online marketing team for AT&T, and then served as Head of Product for Hotels.com/Expedia. Stone has been in the digital publishing space since 2009 and cofounded BookShout.com which sold to private equity in 2015.

Anna Tavis, PhD, is Professor and Academic Director of Human Capital Management Department at NYU School of Professional Studies, Senior Fellow with the Conference Board, and the Academic in Residence with Executive Networks. Dr. Tavis’ latest book, Humans at Work. The Art and Practice of Creating a Remote Workplace, was published in the spring of 2022. She publishes regularly in the business media and  her Harvard Business Review articles with Peter Cappelli, “HR Goes Agile” ( 2018) and “The Performance Management Revolution” (2016), were reprinted in HBR's Must Reads (2016 & 2018), Definitive Management Ideas of the Year (2016 and 2018), and in “Agile:The Insights You Need from Harvard Business Review” (2020). She is a former Executive Editor of People+Strategy Journal and is currently an Associate Editor of Workforce Solutions Review. Dr. Tavis is a frequent presenter at international conferences on the topics of Future of Work, People Analytics and Technology, Employee Experience, and Intelligent Automation in the Workplace. Prior to joining NYU faculty, she navigated a diverse global career in academia, business and consulting. In business, Dr. Tavis was the Head of Motorola’s EMEA OD function based in London, Nokia’s Global Head of Talent Management based in Helsinki, Chief Learning Officer with United Technologies Corp based in Hartford, CT, and Global Head of Talent and Organizational Development with AIG Investments based in NYC. She received her PhD in Comparative Literature from Princeton University and Executive MBA in International Business from the University of South Carolina.

Namrata Tripathi is Founder, President and Publisher of Kokila. Previously, Namrata held editorial positions at HarperCollins, Disney-Hyperion, and Simon and Schuster. Her titles include New York Times bestsellers, Newbery Honor winners, and National Book Award finalists. Namrata grew up in Afghanistan, India, Canada, Pakistan, Germany, and Poland, and has happily called New York City home for the last twenty-five years.