Laurence "Larry" Kirshbaum is the former chief of publishing for Amazon Publishing.

Biography

Born to a Jewish family in Chicago in 1944 and raised in the

Lincoln Park Lincoln Park is a park along Lake Michigan on the North Side of Chicago, Illinois. Named after US President Abraham Lincoln, it is the city's largest public park and stretches for seven miles (11 km) from Grand Avenue (500 N), on the south, ...

neighborhood.Chicago Tribune: "The Man Who`s Betting Millions On 'Gone With The Wind II' by John Blades
October 03, 1988 In 1966, Kirshbaum graduated with a B.A. from the University of Michigan.Vanity Fair: "The Book on Publishing" BY Keith Gessen
October 2011 After school, he worked for Newsweek. In 1970, he co-wrote a book with Roger Rapoport about student protests, ''Is the Library Burning?'' In 1970, he accepted a job as a salesman for Random House selling to drugstores, small groceries, and gift shops. In 1974, he went to work for Warner Books where he became a publisher in 1985, working with Jack Welch and Michael Eisner on their memoirs. He then became

CEO A chief executive officer (CEO), also known as a central executive officer (CEO), chief administrator officer (CAO) or just chief executive (CE), is one of a number of corporate executives charged with the management of an organization especially ...

of the

Time Warner Book Group Hachette Book Group (HBG) is a publishing company owned by Hachette Livre, the largest publishing company in France, and the third largest trade and educational publisher in the world. Hachette Livre is a wholly owned subsidiary of Lagardère Grou ...

. In 2005, he left Time Warner to found his own literary agency. In 2011, he went to work as the chief of publishing for Amazon Publishing; which was striving to build its own publishing business. He signed numerous authors including actress and director Penny Marshall and best-selling writer Timothy Ferris.Wall Street Journal: "Publishing Executive Larry Kirshbaum to Leave Amazon - Kirshbaum, Who Made Waves by Signing Big-Name Authors, to Leave Early Next Year" By Jeffrey A. Trachtenberg
October 25, 2013 In 2012, his efforts were crushed after bookseller

Barnes & Noble Barnes & Noble Booksellers is an American bookseller. It is a Fortune 1000 company and the bookseller with the largest number of retail outlets in the United States. As of July 7, 2020, the company operates 614 retail stores across all 50 U. ...

stated that it would not sell books published by Amazon in its stores. In October 2013, it was announced that he was leaving Amazon and will be replaced by Daphne Durham.

Personal life

He is married to the former Barbara Feder of

Highland Park, Illinois Highland Park is a suburban city located in the southeastern part of Lake County, Illinois, United States, about north of downtown Chicago. Per the 2020 census, the population was 30,176. Highland Park is one of several municipalities located o ...

; they have two children. In 2013, he was accused of sexually assaulting a woman. Catherine Redlich, Kirshbaum's attorney, stated that the incident was a "consensual relationship from a decade ago which turned sour".

References

1944 births Living people 20th-century American Jews American publishing chief executives American businesspeople in the online media industry Amazon (company) people University of Michigan alumni 21st-century American Jews {{US-CEO-stub