2010 TAA Conference on Text and Academic Authoring

Ramada Mall of America Minneapolis, Minnesota

June 24-26, 2010

Textbook Track Session:

Michael R. Lennie Jan Kardys

Contract Advice For Novice Authors

Day/Time: Friday, 3:30 - 4:30 p.m.

Presenters: Michael R. Lennie, an author's attorney and literary agent at Lennie Literary & Authors Attorneys in San Diego, and Jan Kardys, a former director of contracts at several major publishers

Drawing on her background in contract preparation and negotiation for a number of leading publishers including Time Warner, Macmillan, Prentice Hall, Scholastic, and Doubleday, Jan Kardys delivers a wealth of "insider's insights." In this session she will emphasize the most important contract clauses that a veteran-successful author should seek. In an interactive "interview" format with Michael Lennie, Lennie Literary Agency and Authors Attorney, Jan and Michael will sound a cautionary note for negotiating contracts in these difficult economic times. Attendees will receive valuable handouts, including samples of original documents, a contract clause checklist, a deal memo checklist of vital information, and a reversion of rights checklist; a reversion of right request letter to Publisher; a reversion of rights agreement; cancellation documents , and a permissions agreement and permissions checklist.

About the Presenters:

Michael R. Lennie has negotiated hundreds of major contracts for both established and first-time authors of text and trade books. He regularly speaks at workshops and conferences around the country about current legal issues in publishing. Michael also served many years on the TAA Council and has been an active member of TAA since its inception in 1987. He has made presentations, given workshops and appeared on panels at TAA's annual conferences, and has served as a legal advisor to TAA. According to Publishers Weekly magazine Michael has negotiated one of the largest settlements recorded on behalf of textbook authors, and he has successfully litigated a number of other major author/publisher court actions.

Jan L. Kardys has over 30 years of diversified publishing experience for nine major corporations. She was the Director of Contracts at Warner Books/Little Brown and Co., Director of Contracts at Macmillan Publishing Co. and Contracts Director at Prentice Hall/Simon and Schuster. Kardys has also worked at Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, Doubleday, Scholastic, Lippincott & Crowell, Publishers and St. Martin's Press in editorial, art, production, subsidiary rights, sales, and in contracts, copyrights and permissions. Jan also worked for Google for three years and has a wealth of experience to teach authors and artists how to cross-market and use Google products on the Internet. Jan is a literary agent for Black Hawk Enterprises representing a broad spectrum of authors and illustrators.