Maxim Jakubowski’s New Crime Venture

The Bookseller reports today on what Maxim Jakubowski, who shut down London mystery bookshop Murder One at the beginning of this year, is up to: spearheading a new crime imprint, maXcrime, for John Blake starting next March:

Nine maXcrime titles will be published in 2010, all mass market
paperbacks priced at £7.99, in what is described as a "commercial" but
very varied list, covering hard-boiled, historical, cosy,
women-oriented crime and crime in translation.

Jakubowski said he
had received a "call out of the blue" from John Blake asking him to set
up the list. "John Blake has done virtually no fiction over the years,
but we had lunch and we clicked," he said. "The list must fit in with
John Blake so it will be a commercial, not personal, list—something to
appeal to all crime readers without being downmarket. Having been on
the frontline as a bookseller, I think I know where the gaps are."

Blake
said that, having "become the biggest seller of true crime books," he
was looking for a further development. "I bounced it off our big
customers and they were very keen," he said.

The lead title will be HIT by Tara Moss, deemed an “obvious purchase” as much for her sales track in Australia as for her, ah, glamour. Also look out for books by Barbara Baraldi and the lovely Donna Moore, whose novel OLD DOGS is being hailed as the Scottish answer to Janet Evanovich.