Paul Baggaley to Retire as Editor-in-Chief of Bloomsbury's UK Adult Division

Paul Baggaley, editor-in-chief of Bloomsbury's UK consumer adult division, is retiring after 40 years in publishing, the publisher announced on October 29. He will stay in the job until February 28, 2027, the last day of Bloomsbury's current financial year.

The news came from Kathleen Farrar, who runs Bloomsbury's UK consumer division as managing director. No successor was named in Thursday's statement, and it gives no detail on how the job will be filled.

Six years at Bloomsbury after Picador

Baggaley moved to Bloomsbury in early 2020. Before that he spent 11 years as publisher at Picador. Bloomsbury says that over his six and a half years the adult list grew both commercially and critically, and that its adult division was named Publisher of the Year at the 2025 British Book Awards.

The statement also credits him with setting up three separate publishing divisions within the adult business: Adult Trade, General, and Lifestyle. According to Bloomsbury, each has published bestsellers and prize-winners and opened new areas of publishing alongside the company's older literary list.

For the past 12 months, the publisher cites nonfiction bestsellers including Letters to Our Sons by Stephen Graham and Orly Klein and Gillian Anderson's More. It also says the division supplied a third of this year's Baillie Gifford Prize shortlist. On the fiction side it lists bestsellers from Ann Patchett, Louise Kennedy and Alex Aster, along with five Waterstones Books of the Month. Padella was Waterstones' gift book of the year in 2025.

What Baggaley and Farrar said

Baggaley, in remarks released with the announcement, called his years running the Bloomsbury editorial team "a great privilege." On his reasons for going, he said: "Having seen the adult list go from strength to strength, the time feels right for me to step back from a full-time managerial role and to prepare for a new phase of my life." He plans new projects and wants to pass on some of his publishing experience "in different environments," he said.

Staying through February, he said, would "steer a smooth handover"; he expects to spend the coming months working with Farrar on the division's setup.

Farrar said she had worked alongside Baggaley for many years and directly with him in recent months as head of the UK consumer division. "Paul's knowledge and experience have been invaluable to me and he will be much missed by colleagues and authors alike," she said. She described him as "a tireless champion of the Adult Division in a key moment of strategic growth."

Why it matters

The role oversees editorial work across all three adult divisions, the list that Bloomsbury credits with its 2025 Publisher of the Year award. Because Baggaley is staying for roughly four more months, the change at the top falls at the turn of Bloomsbury's financial year, which ends on February 28. The company has not said whether it will appoint from inside or recruit externally.

Source

• Bloomsbury, October 29, 2026: Paul Baggaley to retire from Editor in Chief of Adult Consumer Publishing role

Photo: Bedford Square in London's Bloomsbury district (illustrative). Photo by David Howard, via Wikimedia Commons, licensed CC BY-SA 2.0.