NEW YORK, March 19 —Simon & Schuster announced today that Yahdon Israel will join the company’s adult trade publishing imprint as a Senior Editor. He starts on Monday, March 22.

Yahdon has a passion for promoting literacy and connecting readers with books. He brings an entrepreneurial spirit to these pursuits as the founder of a popular book club, host of a literary podcast, creative writing teacher, event producer, magazine editor, and writer, as well as his work in support of several prestigious literary awards.

A graduate of Pace University, Yahdon has an MFA from The New School, and teaches creative writing at CUNY and the Sackett Street Writers’ Workshop. His work has appeared in Poets & Writers, Guernica, LitHub, and other outlets. He was Editorial Director of Northside Media and Editor-in-Chief of Brooklyn Magazine. He also served as Content and Social Media Director for MakersFinders, Inc.

Yahdon began snapping pictures of stylishly dressed New Yorkers reading books around town and posting them on Instagram with the hashtag #LiterarySwag. This practice morphed into a cultural movement comprising the Literaryswag Book Club, which boasts hundreds of members, monthly meetings, and a robust social media presence; and the podcast Lit, a weekly interview series hosted by Yahdon featuring writers talking about books and culture. Yahdon describes Literary Swag as “the intersection of fashion and literature, which makes literature more accessible to people who don’t read” (the quote is from this NBC News video interview with him).

Yahdon has also served as a preliminary reader for both the Whiting Award and the Aspen Words Literary Award, and has worked extensively with the board of the National Book Critics Circle, including helping to produce the NBCC Awards ceremony.

At Simon & Schuster, Yahdon will acquire both fiction and nonfiction.

Simon & Schuster, a ViacomCBS Company, is a global leader in general interest publishing, dedicated to providing the best in fiction and nonfiction for readers of all ages, and in all printed, digital and audio formats. Its distinguished roster of authors includes many of the world’s most popular and widely recognized writers, and winners of the most prestigious literary honors and awards. It is home to numerous well-known imprints and divisions such as Simon & Schuster, Scribner, Atria Books, Gallery Books, Adams Media, Avid Reader Press, Simon & Schuster Children’s Publishing and Simon & Schuster Audio and international companies in Australia, Canada, India and the United Kingdom, and proudly brings the works of its authors to readers in more than 200 countries and territories. For more information visit our website at www.simonandschuster.com.

Contact:
Julia Prosser, VP, Director of Publicity
212-698-7529; Julia.Prosser@simonandschuster.com