The Inside Story Behind SouthComm’s Rapid-Fire Breakup

“The single hardest thing to do in business is to make a deal, whether you’re buying or selling.” Former SouthComm, Inc. COO Blair Johnson knew the magnitude of the task before him when, in November 2017, the company’s equity backer Solidus ousted CEO Chris Ferrell and indicated its desire to exit the publishing business within eight months. “At that time, Solidus had decided they wanted to liquidate their position and get out of SouthComm,” Johnson tells Folio:. “[Managing partner] Vic Gatto and the board made a decision that we needed to do it, and do it quickly, and that Chris was probably not the right person to do it. He likes to buy and build, and it’s a different strategy when you have to liquidate.” And so Solidus handed the company reins to Johnson—who took over as CEO—and CFO Bob Mahoney, and the pair immediately began the process of selling off a company that comprised alt-weeklies serving five different cities, a robust b2b media business, and hundreds of employees, among other assets. In a b2b-media space characterized by frequent mergers and acquisitions, the circumstances may have felt a bit like déjà vu all over again for Johnson, who had arrived at SouthComm from Cygnus Business Media in 2015 after four years helping transition that company from bankruptcy to breakup. “We essentially had eight different entities that we had to find a new home for,” Johnson continues. “Clearly, the biggest of these was the b2b assets from legacy Cygnus.” The relative... Continue reading at 'Folio Magazine'

[ Folio Magazine | 2018-08-03 00:00:00 UTC ]
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The best Black Friday Amazon deals on Kindles, Echo speakers, Fire TV devices and more

Now that Amazon has not one but two Prime Days per year, you might think they'd run out of deals. Not so. The world's largest retailer has plenty of deals to go around for Black Friday, including these discounts on their own devices. And for this sale, you don't even have to be a Prime member to... Continue reading at Engadget

[ Engadget | 2022-11-25 08:00:21 UTC ]
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Choosing to Bear Witness: Writing the Story of a Body

My clearest memory of my freshman year of college takes place in the emergency room of Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, where I was studying English Literature at Boston University and living on the eighteenth floor of Warren Towers, in Tower C, in a room with southern exposure. Despite... Continue reading at Literrary Hub

[ Literrary Hub | 2022-11-17 09:53:52 UTC ]
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Beneath Its Pink Cover, ‘Lessons in Chemistry’ Offers a Story About Power

The best-selling debut author Bonnie Garmus created Elizabeth Zott, a chemist battling a sexist 1950s establishment, as the role model she craved — and found that readers wanted the same. Continue reading at The New York Times

[ The New York Times | 2022-11-16 14:07:21 UTC ]
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'Black Panther: Wakanda Forever' Alters How Superhero Stories Handle Death

Comic book saviors get resurrected all the time. Chadwick Boseman’s 2020 death made that impossible for Black Panther’s sequel. Continue reading at Wired

[ Wired | 2022-11-10 12:00:00 UTC ]
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Sharjah World Book Capital Supports a Fire-Damaged Italian Bookstore

The Bologna bookstore, Giannino Stoppani, was damaged by fire in May. Sharjah World Book Capital has contributed €50,000 to assist. The post Sharjah World Book Capital Supports a Fire-Damaged Italian Bookstore appeared first on Publishing Perspectives. Continue reading at Publishing Perspectives

[ Publishing Perspectives | 2022-11-08 12:43:42 UTC ]
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Review: The biggest, most intricately ambitious little story you'll read this year

Irish author Claire Keegan is one of those U.S. 'discoveries' who have been known back home for years. With 'Foster,' she earns that acclaim and more. Continue reading at Los Angeles Times

[ Los Angeles Times | 2022-11-01 14:00:17 UTC ]
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‘Lachlan gets fired the day Rupert dies’: Murdoch biography stokes succession rumors

New book by Australian reporter Paddy Manning hints at Succession-style feud with ramifications for US rightwing politicsIt’s long been thought that the succession plan for Lachlan Murdoch to take control of Fox Corporation and News Corp was set in stone for when his 91-year-old father, Rupert... Continue reading at The Guardian

[ The Guardian | 2022-10-31 13:39:54 UTC ]
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“A Ghost Is a Memory.” On Bodies, Belief, and the Places Ghost Stories Live

The proprietor’s name is Amy (except that, of course, it isn’t). She’s a kind, petite woman in her forties, the owner of a ghost-themed bookstore in a small southern city. I won’t tell you which city. It’s for your own safety. This is, after all, a ghost story. And most importantly: it’s true.... Continue reading at Literrary Hub

[ Literrary Hub | 2022-10-31 08:57:03 UTC ]
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Is That Black Enough For You?!?: inside the Black cinema revolution of the 70s

Historian and critic Elvis Mitchell talks about his revealing Netflix documentary that focuses on an often forgotten eraI’m worried about Black Panther: Wakanda Forever. The original, released to great fanfare in 2018, was such a hit across the board – with critics, at the box office, as a... Continue reading at The Guardian

[ The Guardian | 2022-10-29 06:17:49 UTC ]
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The Eerie Experience of Watching My Science Fiction Story Become Real

On May 13, I finally got to read my wayward science fiction story “It Is the Voice That Unnerves Me” in The Dread Machine. I had been submitting the story since the spring of 2019, and had thought many times about consigning it to the “retired” list. I knew every word, sentence and section break... Continue reading at Electric Literature

[ Electric Literature | 2022-10-20 11:05:00 UTC ]
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20 Must-Read Horror Short Stories

There's no better time to read horror short stories than October. With Halloween fast approaching, dive into these 20 spooky tales. Continue reading at Book Riot

[ Book Riot | 2022-10-17 10:31:00 UTC ]
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‘Miracle find’: rare Don Quixote and short stories could sell for €900k

Sotheby’s describes 17th-century Cervantes editions as a ‘once in a lifetime’ opportunity for collectorsOne day in the early 1930s, a young Bolivian diplomat named Jorge Ortiz Linares walked into the illustrious Maggs Bros bookshop in London to ask if they might have a particularly fine edition... Continue reading at The Guardian

[ The Guardian | 2022-10-06 13:44:15 UTC ]
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Amitav Ghosh on the Importance of Re-Centering Stories of the Land

Emergence Magazine is an online publication with annual print edition exploring the threads connecting ecology, culture, and spirituality. As we experience the desecration of our lands and waters, the extinguishing of species, and a loss of sacred connection to the Earth, we look to emerging... Continue reading at Literrary Hub

[ Literrary Hub | 2022-10-03 08:59:18 UTC ]
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Qian Julie Wang on Commuting, People-Watching, and Letting the Story Marinate

Qian Julie Wang’s Beautiful Country is out now in paperback from Anchor, so we asked about her routine and the intersection of writing and litigating. * What time of day do you write? I wrote Beautiful Country on my iPhone during my subway commute to and from my law firm job—so it was both the […] Continue reading at Literrary Hub

[ Literrary Hub | 2022-09-26 08:51:56 UTC ]
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‘Everyone’s got a book in them’: boom in memoir industry as ordinary people record their stories

Companies providing ghostwritten autobiographies for people wanting to share histories have seen surge in trade since CovidBrian Lewis grew up on a tough council estate after arriving in Britain as part of the Windrush generation. At the age of eight he developed an interest in chess and joined... Continue reading at The Guardian

[ The Guardian | 2022-09-24 14:00:06 UTC ]
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Inside the Narrators Booth: Things You Never Knew About Audiobook Narrators

Ever wondered what goes on behind the scenes while recording audiobooks? Six prolific audiobook narrators gave us the inside scoop. Continue reading at Book Riot

[ Book Riot | 2022-09-23 10:31:00 UTC ]
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Elizabeth Strout has ‘millions of stories to tell’

In "Lucy by the Sea," Lucy Barton returns, this time riding out the pandemic’s early wave with her ex-husband in Maine. Continue reading at The Washington Post

[ The Washington Post | 2022-09-22 15:00:00 UTC ]
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The Best Short Stories about Friendship

Friendship is such a universal and central theme to all of our lives, that picking just a small number of the best short stories about such a broad theme is always going to be a challenge. However, the following stories are by some of the finest masters of the short […] Continue reading at Interesting Literature

[ Interesting Literature | 2022-09-21 14:00:43 UTC ]
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At 9, Javier Zamora walked 4,000 miles to the U.S. At 29, he was ready to tell the story

Javier Zamora talks about "Solito," his harrowing memoir about journeying from El Salvador to the U.S. as an unaccompanied 9-year-old. Continue reading at Los Angeles Times

[ Los Angeles Times | 2022-09-15 14:00:30 UTC ]
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Ling Ma’s surreal stories explore the absurdity of labels

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[ The Washington Post | 2022-09-14 14:00:57 UTC ]
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