What's Next For Judith Regan?

Posted on December 19, 2006

So, what's next for fired publisher Judith Regan? Apparently, a lawsuit for breach of contract and perhaps libel against HarperCollins. Regan has hired top gun Los Angeles attorney Bert Fields to represent her against HarperCollins. And it's getting really nasty. HarperCollins says it fired Regan for cause, because she made anti-Semitic comments to one of its attorneys. Bert Fields (who is Jewish) says Regan made no comments that would offend any Jew.

So, the lawsuit is probably on. But what will happen to the ReganBooks authors? So far, HarperCollins says that the imprint will continue to operate as it always has. But everyone knows that Judith Regan is ReganBooks. Without her, how will the imprint survive? She could move to another publishing house and take her authors with her, or she could move to a movie or tv studio.

Others doubted a quick return to publishing, though. "Right now she's pretty radioactive for the book world," said an executive at a large publisher, speaking anonymously. "My guess is that she's not going to be linking up with a major house in the short run. But in the long run she could." Both Walter, who spoke with Regan on Sunday, and Fields said the former publisher had not decided her next professional move. Nor whether she will remain in Los Angeles, they said.
"My guess is she's going to take some time off," Walter said. "She has a lot of decisions ahead of her. If she goes back into publishing, I'd expect her to do something small. She wants to break free from how publishing works, to be more nimble and to produce books faster based on news as it breaks."

We have to say that all the moralizing from News Corp. about how tacky her books were rings pretty hollow. Rupert Murdoch was only too happy to publish the O.J. Simpson book -- until advertisers threated to pull their ads from Fox. Then suddenly he has a an attack of conscience. What a coincidence.