Scott Pack leaves HarperCollins for new venture

The Friday Project publisher Scott Pack is leaving HarperCollins to start a new business venture.

Pack, who ran the Friday Project imprint as well as online author community Authonomy, will be leaving at the end of December.

The Friday Project imprint, which was acquired by HarperCollins in April 2008 with a remit to publish innovative titles in experimental ways, will now be wound down, publishing titles currently on the schedule but with no further acquisitions. Authonomy will continue as before, being formally relaunched in the New Year.

Pack said: "I am hugely excited about this new venture but it is going to be so hard leaving the excellent Friday Project team and our amazing authors. HarperCollins has been incredibly supportive of this experimental imprint and deserve heaps of credit for doing so. I will look on enviously as the remaining titles, and there are some real crackers to come, are published next year. Thanks to everyone who bought, read or helped to publish our eclectic array of books over the years."

HarperCollins UK executive publisher David Roth-Ey said: "The Friday Project has been at the forefront of digital and experimental pricing for over five years now. It has blazed a trail within the industry. It’s impossible, however, to imagine The Friday Project without Scott, and so I have taken the difficult decision to let the imprint come to a natural closure following his departure. We are very sad to see him go."

Books published by the Friday Project include Confessions of a GP by Benjamin Daniels, which sold more than 500,000 copies across all formats, and the backlist of sci-fi author Brian Aldiss. Writers such as Kat French were published after being discovered on Authonomy, going on to sign a three-book deal with Avon.

Rachel Faulkner and Cicely Aspinall who work alongside Scott will remain at HarperCollins, overseeing the remaining Friday Project list and Authonomy.