Official Press Release

5 MILLION COPY FIRST PRINTING LEADS THE BIGGEST BOOK RELEASE OF THE YEAR ON TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 9.

EXTRAORDINARY MARKETING CAMPAIGN

CONTINUES WITH MONTH-LONG BLITZ INCLUDING:

National Publicity and Advertising – Custom Store Wraps –

7 City Author Tour by Bus – Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Balloon and Promotions

New York, NY, November 3, 2010—Five days from now the biggest book release of 2010 hits retailers everywhere. With a 5 million copy first printing and massive distribution across the United States and Canada, Diary of a Wimpy Kid: The Ugly Truth, the fifth volume in Jeff Kinney’s #1 bestselling Diary of a Wimpy Kid series, goes on sale on Tuesday, November 9, 2010.  Wimpy Kid awareness is at an all-time high due to a dynamic pre-sale and ongoing marketing campaign that includes national publicity and advertising, a 7-city author bus tour that includes theater and charity appearances by author Jeff Kinney, custom designed materials, authorless event kits, and more. The already immense recognition of Diary of a Wimpy Kid will rise to new heights throughout November as the campaign continues with major marketing, advertising, and publicity the entire month, culminating in the first-ever Diary of a Wimpy Kid Balloon in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade. Among the highlights of the month long and seasonal blitz are:

• On Friday, November 5, Jeff Kinney will appear on CNN’s American Morning and CNBC’s Power Lunch.
• National advertising runs throughout the month on poptropica.com, cartoonetwork.com, in Times Square on the Toys R Us Geoffreytron (photo attached), and in trade and consumer press.
• Custom designed exterior store wraps are unveiled this week at Anderson’s Bookshop in Naperville, IL, (photos attached) and Children’s Book World in Haverford, PA.
• Unique promotional items, including purple character-shaped Wimpy Kid wrist bands, water bottles, oversized posters and standees, reproducible event kits and more, ship to more than 3,000 retailers and libraries across the country.
  • Hundreds of authorless parties at retailers and libraries are planned.
  • Jeff Kinney will tour for charity and store events in Dallas, Austin, Little Rock, Memphis, Nashville, Birmingham, San Diego, and New York. Visit www.wimpykid.com for exact stops.
  • Photos of the Diary of a Wimpy Kid Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade Giant Helium Balloon will be released next week.
  • From more than 14,000 entries received, on November 10, 2010, ABRAMS will announce the winner of a contest to bring a lucky fan and three friends or family to the 2010 Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade to sit in exclusive grandstand seating.

“Diary of a Wimpy Kid: The Ugly Truth is by far the biggest book release of the year,” said Michael Jacobs, President and CEO of ABRAMS. “From the excitement that’s been building since we announced the publication of Jeff Kinney’s new book in the summer through the amazing response we’ve have from customers, we’re confident that next Tuesday will be a huge day for books sales everywhere. From the start we believed that a Diary of a Wimpy Kid could fly, and it definitely will for retailers as well as for 45 million people who will have a chance to watch the balloon during the parade.”

Books in the core Wimpy Kid series by Jeff Kinney include Diary of a Wimpy Kid, Diary of a Wimpy Kid (2007): Rodrick Rules (2008), Diary of a Wimpy Kid: The Last Straw (2009), and Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Dog Days (2009). Jeff Kinney has also written and illustrated the Diary of a Wimpy Kid Do-It-Yourself Book (2007), and The Wimpy Kid Movie Diary (2010). The series is a fixture on the USA Today bestseller list, the first book in the series has remained in the top 150 for more than 170 weeks, and the Wall Street Journal, and Publishers Weekly bestseller lists. It has also remained consistently in the top spots on the New York Times lists since publication of the first book in the series.

More than 42 million Diary of a Wimpy Kid books will be in print in the United States and Canada as of November 9, 2010. The books have been sold in more than 37 countries in 35 languages around the world. Published by Amulet Books, an imprint of ABRAMS, Kinney’s work has been widely credited for its ability to turn reluctant readers on to books. In 2010, the movie adaptation of Diary of a Wimpy Kid grossed more than $75 million worldwide in box office sales, the book series won a Nickelodeon Kids’ Choice Award, and books in the series won numerous awards voted on by students and teachers in schools around the globe. In 2009, Jeff Kinney was named one of TIME magazine’s most influential people in the world. A second movie, Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Rodrick Rules, will hit theaters in March 2011.

About Amulet Books: Created in 2004 to specialize in books for middle grade and young adult readers alongside Abrams Books for Young Readers, which publishes books for readers up to age twelve, Amulet Books publishes bestselling and award-winning fiction and nonfiction. Amulet Books is an imprint of ABRAMS.