NEWSNOTES

Publishers

AOL Time Warner is taking back its old name, Time Warner, and its Internet division, AOL, will be called AOL.

Marvel Enterprises announced that it has settled a legal dispute with Captain America creator Joe Simon over rights to the comic-book franchise, clearing the way for the publisher to develop films and other projects based on the iconic character. Marvel didn't release the terms of the settlement, but said that Simon had agreed to assign Marvel all copyrights he held to Captain America.

EDGE Science Fiction and Fantasy Publishing, winner of both the Alberta Emerging Publisher of the Year Award and the Independent Publisher Book Award for first book, "The Black Chalice" by Marie Jakober, has announced its acquisition of Tesseract Books Ltd, Canada's premiere publisher of speculative fiction. The Tesseract imprint has been in use since 1985, and now has more than 50 editions in print. Since 1985, the Tesseract Books imprint has focused on "the best work Canadian speculative fiction authors have to offer." Tesseract Books publishes short story anthologies, novels and translations of French Canadian works. Award winning authors Candas Jane Dorsey and Timothy J. Anderson will continue to be involved with the Tesseract imprint as authors and editors. For further information: Brian Hades at 403-254-0160. EDGE and TESSERACT are imprints of Hades Publications Inc.

In late October, WizKids laid of 23 employees as a result of overoptimistic financial projections and overenthusiastic scheduling of product releases. Janna Silverstein was among those let go. The publishing program continues with a new director, appointed in late August.

Marvel comics hired a new publisher, Dan Buckley. Bill Jemas, president and publisher of consumer products since 2000 and chief operating officer since 2002, is no longer overseeing the publishing froup. Jemas will remain with the company as chief marketing ofcer, but the COO spot will remain open for now. Jemas joined Marvel in 2000 and led the publishing group to improved sales and an increased emphasis on the book business, but his confrontational style often drew criticism.

Books

A PDF of the new Telos catalogue can be downloaded from www.telos.co.uk (bottom right hand side of first page) and in there are details of all titles for the first half of next year. Of special interest...