non-fiction

-SPRING 2014 Rights Guide-AGENTSBen Mason
Becky Thomas
for further information on all clients & titles in this guide, please write to
Ben Mason, Fox Mason Ltd, 36-38 Glasshouse Street, London, W1B 5DL
or email [email protected] / +44 (0) 20 7287 0972 or +44 (0) 7876 454 940
fiction for readers who enjoy Cailin
Moran, David Nicholls, Lauren
Weisberger & Polly Vernon
How to Lose Weight and
Alienate People
by Ollie Quain
Is there such a thing as the perfect body?
Vivian Ward thinks she is in total control of her life.
Actually…she’s thirty five, an out-of-work actress
who puts more effort into partying than getting good
parts, is estranged from her family and emotionally
unavailable to her boyfriend.
UK PUBLISHER Mira/Harlequin
PUBLICATION May 2014 (Ppbk)
LENGTH
400 pages
All rights available excluding:
UK & Commonwealth (Harlequin);
Norway (Cappelen Damm)
Truth is, the only thing she’s in control of is what’s
on her plate…
But then she meets movie star Maximilian Fry, who's
just as screwed up, and journeys into a world of
celebrity even more damaging than the one she was
already living in. Will image triumph, or will she
realise that some of her answers lie within?
A hilarious and thought-provoking novel about selfesteem and the cult of skinny...and what happens
when you’re funny about food but the joke starts to
wear thin.
Ollie Quain has worked in television development, as a freelance journalist on women’s magazines
and as a copywriter for The O2 arena. This is her debut novel.
fiction for readers who enjoy David
Sedaris, Lena Dunham & Lauren
Weisberger
Low Expectations
by Elizabeth Aaron
Georgie has a glamorous career in fashion.
Her boss doesn’t know her name, but working for a
genius will pay off one day. She hopes.
She also has great friends.
Granted, they’re sometimes a bit superficial, but
who wants to discuss a global crisis on a friday
night?
UK PUBLISHER
PUBLICATION
LENGTH
Quercus
July 2014 trade Ppbk
315 pages
All rights available excluding UK &
Commonwealth (Quercus)
And she’s enjoying her single life.
Eighteen months of celibacy, and not a hot
prospect in sight.
Perhaps life’s not quite what she was hoping for . . .
But how can she change it, and what does she
really want? Stuck somewhere between a quarterlife crisis and self-fulfillment, Georgie is determined
that this year, everything will be different. Armed
only with her sense of humour, some black eyeliner
and her best attempt at ‘charming’, she’s on the
way. But just how long will the new improved
Georgie last?
Low Expectations is a smart, raunchy, laugh-outloud novel about what it means to be a ‘Real’.
Elizabeth Aaron is a 25-year-old Fashion Design graduate who has worked for Alexander McQueen,
Jonathan Saunders and Givenchy. Simultaneously engaged with creative writing, she participated in the
Oxford Literary Festival Creative Writing Course. She moved to Paris in 2012 to write Low Expectations,
while working as a nanny, the CEO of Le Figaro. She is currently writing her second novel and first
screenplay. She is also an illustrator and blogger: http://www.elizabeth-aaron.com
fiction for readers who enjoy
Charles Dickens, Spike Milligan, PG
Wodehouse & G.K. Chesterton
Bleak Expectations
by Mark Evans
UK PUBLISHER
PUBLICATION
LENGTH
Corsair
May 2014 (Ppbk)
416 pages
All rights available excluding:
World English (Corsair)
Like the radio series, but with added jokes, extra
bits of story, additional dimensions to characters
and masses more paper. Unless you're reading it as
an e-book in which case... masses more digital
information bits…..
B L E A K E X P E C TAT I O N S re c o u n t s t h e
remarkable adventures of young Pip Bin as he tries
to repair his destroyed family and distinctly
damaged life, aided by his best friend Harry Biscuit
and definitely not aided by his cruel and ironically
named guardian Mr Gently Benevolent and his
accomplices, the fearsome Hardthrasher siblings.
Weep! As Pip is sent to Britain's nastiest boarding
school, St Bastard's. Gasp! As the true extent of his
despicable guardian's plan becomes clear. Worry!
As our hero is committed to the Workhouse, where
he meets the hideous poverty-punishments of the
treadmill, the grindstone and the painwheel. Sigh!
As Pip finds love with London's most eligible frail
beauty, Miss Flora Dies-Early. Find a tenterhook
and sit on it! Grim circumstances, mistaken
identities, unlikely inheritances, nightmarish court
cases, ridiculous names, convenient coincidences to
resolve plot problems, over-sentimental death
scenes and lots and lots of adjectives: BLEAK
EXPECTATIONS is the novel Charles Dickens
might have written after drinking far too much gin.
Praise for the Radio 4 series: ‘Mark Evans writes one of the wittiest, most ingenious scripts on the
air, a Dickensian pastiche with a slight Rocky Horror Show echo.’ Daily Telegraph.
Mark Evans has written five series of his own Victorian comedy for Radio 4, BLEAK
EXPECTATIONS, starring Anthony Head. He is an experienced comedy and entertainment writer
for TV and Radio; credits include THAT MITCHELL AND WEBB LOOK, THE LATE
EDITION, and THAT MITCHELL AND WEBB SOUND.
fiction for readers who enjoy Helen
Fielding, Sue Townsend, Dawn French
and Jonathan Lynn
Diary of an Unsmug Married
by Polly James
If your marriage is far from perfect you’ll love
Molly Bennett’s diary …
Meet Molly Bennett. She’s just passed a ‘landmark
birthday’ and is mother to two hormone-driven,
warring teenagers. She’s married to Max, who buys
her last-minute birthday presents in M & S, and
works for a man prone to snooping through her
emails.
UK PUBLISHER Avon Books
PUBLICATION March, 2014 (Ppbk)
LENGTH
489 pages
All rights available excluding:
UK& Commonwealth (Avon Books)
Maybe she needs some more excitement in her life.
Everyone seems to be having a better time of it
than her, especially her Dad who’s in Thailand
searching for a new wife, and her next door
neighbour Ellen with her string of toyboys. So
when Max starts taking an increased interest in
keeping fit and going on ‘business trips’ abroad and
less of an interest in their sex life, Molly begins to
despair. That is until an old school friend starts
flirting with her through Facebook …
What will happen if Molly does something out of
character and stops being the person everyone
wants her to be?
‘A properly good writer’ India Knight
Polly James is the blogger behind the blog Mid-Wife Crisis, which details family life from inside
the world of politics. It was shortlisted for the Orwell Prize.
fiction for readers who enjoy Willy
Vlautin, Hunter S T hompson,
Raymond Carver, Patrick de Witt and
Charles Bukowski
The Drive by Tyler Keevil
UK PUBLISHER Myriad Editions
PUBLICATION August, 2013 (Ppbk)
LENGTH
385 pages
All rights available excluding World English
(Myriad Editions)
On a hot August day at Vancouver airport, a
distraught young man wanders into the Odyssey
car rental agency, carrying a backpack full of beer
and boxer shorts. Trevor is in the midst of a serious
crisis – at least in his own mind. His all-toocomfortable existence as a wannabe filmmaker has
been disrupted by a single phone call from his
Czech girlfriend.
In an attempt to get over her, and get his mojo
back, Trevor rents a Dodge Neon and blazes down
Highway 99, heading for California. But soon his
journey is fraught with peril, and all he has for
protection are a semi-automatic pistol, his trusty
plastic visor and an increasingly fractious flearidden cat.
As the drugs and the heartbreak kick in, the
question is no longer whether Trevor will get over
his girlfriend's infidelity but whether he'll get out
alive.
A fast-paced and hilarious contemporary odyssey,
told with a searing clarity reminiscent of Willy
Vlautin or Patrick de Witt, The Drive has all the
adventure and surrealism of Hunter S Thompson's
Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas – but overlaid
with heartfelt yearning and hope.
Previously FIREBALL
Winner of the Wales Book of the Year People’s Prize 2011, Short-listed for Guardian Not the
Booker Prize.
All rights available excluding World English (Parthian)
Tyler Keevil grew up in Vancouver, Canada, and currently lives in mid-Wales. His short fiction
has appeared in a wide range of magazines and anthologies, including Black Static, Brace,
Interzone, New Welsh Review, On Spec, and Staple. Fireball, won the Wales Book of the Year
People’s Prize and was short-listed for the Guardian Not-The-Booker Award. fiction
for readers who enjoy
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Aminatta
Forna, Khaled Hosseini & Andrea Levy
The Orchard of Lost Souls
by Nadifa Mohamed
It is 1988 and Hargeisa waits. Whispers of
revolution travel on the dry winds but still the
dictatorship remains secure.
Soon, and through the eyes of three women, we will
see Somalia fall.
UK PUBLISHER
US PUBLISHER
PUBLICATION
LENGTH
Simon & Schuster
FSG
June, 2014 (Ppbk)
352 pages
All rights available excluding UK &
Commonwealth (HarperCollins), USA &
Canada (FSG); France (JC Lattes), Germany
(C.H. Beck), Sweden (Natur och Kultur),
Finland (Atena), Norway (Vigmostad &
Bjorke), Holland (Orlando/Bruna), Turkey
(Pegasus), Serbia (Vulkan), Brazil (Editora
Alaude)
Nine-year-old Deqo has left the vast refugee camp
she was born in, lured to the city by the promise of
her first pair of shoes. Kawsar, a solitary widow, is
trapped in her little house with its garden clawed
from the desert, confined to her bed after a savage
beating in the local police station. Filsan, a young
female soldier, has moved from Mogadishu to
suppress the rebellion growing in the north. And as
the country is unravelled by a civil war that will
shock the world, the fates of the three women are
twisted irrevocably together.
Intimate, frank, brimming with beauty and fierce
love, THE ORCHARD OF LOST SOULS is an
unforgettable account of ordinary lives lived in
extraordinary times.
Previously BLACK MAMBA BOY
Long-listed for the Orange Prize; Winner of the Betty Trask Prize; Shortlisted for the
Dylan Thomas Prize, the John Llewellyn Rhys Prize, the Guardian First Book Award,
and the PEN Open Book award. Best Book of the Year: National Public Radio; Boston
Globe; Guardian
All rights available excluding UK & Commonwealth (HarperCollins), USA & Canada (Farrar
Strauss & Giroux), France (Phebus), Italy (Neri Pozza) Netherlands (Orlando, AWBruna), Spain
(Planeta), Turkey (Pegasus), Croatia (Profil), China (And Wanrong Book Co Ltd), Korea (Joong
Ang), Norway (Vigmostad & Bjorke), Serbia (Alnari)
Nadifa Mohamed was born in Hargeisa, Somalia in 1981 and was educated in the UK, studying
History and Politics at St. Hilda's College, Oxford. She lives in London and is currenlty working on
her third novel.
fiction - historical / genre
for readers who enjoy Iain Pears,
Andrew Taylor, Essie Fox & Lyndsay
Faye
The Pierced Heart
by Lynn Shepherd
19th century detective Charles Maddox returns once
more, in a novel inspired by Bram Stoker’s DRACULA.
Clever, chilling and compelling by turns, DARKNESS
VISIBLE both echoes that iconic book and engages in a
new and enticing way with the vampire theme that has
become such a powerful stimulus for both film and
horror fiction in the past few years. Lynn Shepherd
takes the vampire motif back to its original literary
roots, and re-examines it in the context of midVictorian scientific and technological progress, as
exemplified in the Great Exhibition of 1851, which
forms a fascinating back-drop to the novel.
US PUBLISHER
PUBLICATION
LENGTH
Random House
August, 2013
352 pages
All rights available excluding:
USA & Canada (Delecorte/Bantam,
Random House)
Hired by the University of Oxford to verify the
credentials of an enigmatic potential donor to its
ancient library, Charles Maddox travels halfway across
Europe to the Austrian Empire, and the castle of the
Baron Von Reisenberg. Aristocrat, industrialist, and
pioneering scientist, the Baron is also a man who hides
a horrific secret. Barely escaping with his life, Charles
returns eventually to London to find the city in the
throes of a series of brutal murders that have left three
young prostitutes savagely mutilated by a killer they’re
calling The Vampire. But could the girls’ severed heads
and eviscerated hearts be evidence of an even more
appalling depravity?
DARKNESS VISIBLE dramatizes a fatal clash
between science and superstition, at a time of profound
change and dangerous transition.
Previously A TREACHEROUS LIKENESS (one of Kirkus Reviews’ 100 Best Fiction Books for
2013), TOM-ALL-ALONE’S (Spectator Books of the Year 2012) and MURDER AT
MANSFIELD PARK (starred reviews in Kirkus Reviews and Publishers Weekly).
Lynn Shepherd lives near Oxford, with her husband. She studied English at Oxford in the 1980s,
and went back to do a doctorate in 2003. In between she spent 15 years in business, first in the City,
and later in PR and has been a professional copywriter for the last ten years. She published her first
novel MURDER AT MANSFIED PARK in 2010.
fiction for readers who enjoy Zadie
Smith, John Lanchester & Richard
Millward
The Bricks that Built the
Houses
by Kate Tempest
UK PUBLISHER
DELIVERY PUBLICATION
LENGTH
Bloomsbury
September 2014
April 2015
75,000 words
All rights available excluding World
(Bloomsbury) who have secured rights in
US (Bloomsbury), France (Payot et
Rivages), Holland (Agathon), Brazil (Casa
Da Palarra)
The 2013 Winner of the Ted Hughes Prize and
published playwright, poet and rapper, Kate
Tempest, has written an amazing debut novel. Set on
an urban high street, THE BRICKS THAT BUILT
THE HOUSES explores what goes on behind the
shop fronts of a community and the fronts we present
to the world. When ‘recruitment consultant’ Harry
meets dancer Becky at a music industry party one
night, his façade drops and for the first time he
reveals his true self – a high end drug dealer with big
dreams - to this perfect stranger. Becky, in turn, is
hiding her sideline as an erotic masseuse from her
family while she supports her streetwise uncles in
running their café. The book explores the conflicts
and revelations that can change, enhance and
damage daily lives as people learn to live and love
together. THE BRICKS THAT BUILT THE
HOUSES is a multi-character tale that captures what
it's like when your best intentions, your need for
survival and to be loved, don’t necessarily lead to the
right decisions. Can you change your morals when it’s
the one you love who is breaking them? Is it braver to
stay or to walk away? And if you play the same
situations endlessly, repeating the same mistakes, can
you learn enough to change your habits?
Kate Tempest grew up in South-East London, where she still lives. Starting out as a rapper, she
now can add poet and playwright to her CV. Her work includes Everything Speaks in its Own Way,
a collection of poems on her own Zingaro imprint; GlassHouse, a play for Cardboard Citizens; and
the Paines Plough commissioned plays Wasted (published by Methuen) and Hopelessly Devoted.
Brand New Ancients won the Ted Hughes Prize 2013 (Kate being the only ever recipient under 40)
and is published by Picador. She is currently working on a new collection of poems (also to be
published by Picador October 2014), the novel and a record.
fiction for readers who enjoy Philip
Roth, J M Coetzee, John Fante &
Christopher Isherwood
The Clerk
by Jacques Strauss
UK PUBLISHER DELIVERY
PUBLICATION
LENGTH
Cape (Random House)
February 2014
April 2015 (Hbk)
300 pages
All rights available excluding UK &
Commonwealth excluding Canada (Cape)
Wilhelm Deyer was the principal of a state-run
school camp, situated just outside the town of
Barberton, South Africa. He lived with his wife,
Petronella and their two sons, Werner and Marius. In
1976 a gruesome family murder took place on a
farm, just a few miles away. Petronella was helpless as
the family began to fall apart. Her husband became
obsessed with a farm worker who witnessed the
massacre. Her sons were locked in a battle for the
affections of a camp teacher, and the allure of the
white trash family down the road, threatened to
corrupt the decent Afrikaners of the community. One
night a tragedy changes each of their lives,
irrevocably. Two decades later, Werner is living with his mother
and invalid father in a small Pretoria flat. South
Africa is a changed place and Werner is forced to
hold a tedious job in administration at the local
university. An unexplained accident in 1976 has left
his father bedridden and hostile toward the family. As
Werner feels his life slip away, his thoughts turn to
patricide as a means to correct the coarse of their
lives. If it is not possible to undo what happened,
Werner’s desperation will threaten not only his own
family but also those still living in the aftermath of
what happened in Barberton. Previously The Dubious Salvation of Jack V
**WINNER OF THE REGIONAL COMMONWEALTH WRITERS’ PRIZE 2012**
‘Smart, charming, funny, highly astute and subtly political. A really terrific read’ -Douglas Coupland
All rights available excluding UK & Commonwealth (Cape), USA & Canada (FSG), Germany
(Berlin Verlag), Korea (Minumsa).
Jacques Strauss is a 30 year old South African. Strauss studied philosophy at university, obsessed
over Derrida and now writes reams of corporate copy for a London firm.
fiction for readers who enjoy Agatha
Cristie and Alexander McCall Smith
Death in Paradise
by Robert Thorogood
Robert Thorogood is the brilliant creator and
writer behind the hit BBC series DEATH IN
PARADISE, which is about to go into its fourth
series and calls in regular audiences of 8-9 million
per episode. It’s proved a big hit in Australia (on
ABC1) and North America (PBS, the same channel
that broadcast Downton Abbey). The show has
recently sold to Germany and Spain.
UK PUBLISHER DELIVERY
PUBLICATION
LENGTH
Mira/Harlequin
July 2014
2015 (Hbk)
80,000 words
All rights available excluding UK &
Commonwealth excluding Canada
(Harlequin)
Set on the fictional Caribbean island of SaintMarie but filmed on the gorgeous real one of
Guadeloupe, this comedy-crime-drama follows
uptight Met office Richard Poole, who flew in to
investigate the death of a colleague but ended up
staying on as police chief. Poole proves to be a
brilliant detective, solving several complex murders.
He's not quite suited to either the pace of life on
the island or the heat and sand, neither of which he
likes very much. He also doesn't like seafood.
However, the things that annoy him also make him
a brilliant detective. He worries at every aspect of a
puzzle until it’s solved. He ignores nothing, no
matter how inconsequential it seems and this often
leads to a breakthrough. He’s not a people person,
but he’s a brilliant intuitive analytical mind. Just
don’t ask him to make small talk!
Robert Thorogood was educated at Cambridge University, where he was President of Footlights.
He has written and adapted numerous dramas and features for the BBC and ITV.
non-fiction – memoir for readers
who enjoy Patti Smith, Keith Richards
& Jon Savage
Clothes, Clothes, Clothes,
Music, Music, Music, Boys,
Boys, Boys by Viv Albertine
Viv Albertine is one of a handful of original punks
who changed music, and the discourse around it,
forever. In Clothes ... Music ... Boys a story hitherto
dominated by male voices is recast through the eyes
of one of the most glamorous, uncompromising
and iconic figures of the time.
UK PUBLISHER Faber & Faber
UK PUBLICATIONSpring 2014
LENGTH
TBC
All rights available excluding UK &
Commonwealth rights (Faber)
After forming The Flowers of Romance with Sid
Vicious in 1976, Viv joined The Slits and made
musical history as one of the first generation of
punk bands. Here is the story of what it was like to
be a girl at the height of punk: the sex, the drugs,
the guys, the tours, the hard lessons learnt and
those not considered. From Madonna to Lady
Gaga, fashion to feminims, Viv Albertine has
influenced a range of exceptional artists. Here,
before and beyond the break-up of The Slits in
1982, is the full story of a life lived unscripted, with
foolishness, bravery and great emotional honesty.
A memoir full of raw and uncompromising
anecdote and opinion, Clothes, Clothes, Clothes.
Music, Music, Music. Boys, Boys, Boys is an
unflinching account of a life lived on the frontiers
of experience, by a true pioneer.
‘unflinching, candid, revelatory: the perils of being a pioneer.’ Jon Savage
Viv Albertine was born in Sydney, Australia to a French Corsican father and Swiss mother and
brought up in working class North London. She dropped out of school at 17 and went to work in
Camden music venue Dingwalls. She later returned to art college where she met long term
boyfriend Mick Jones, later of The Clash. Inspired by and immersed in the London music scene,
Viv formed The Flowers of Romance with Sid Vicious. After seeing the all-female band The Slits
play, she called them the next day and joined the band as their guitarist in 1977. The influential
group disbanded in 1982 and Viv started a career in filmmaking. Rescuing herself from a life of safe
but dull domesticity, she is now back making art and music with a solo album The Vermillion
Border released last year to critical acclaim.
non-fiction - social history/
popular culture for readers who
enjoy Dominic Sandbrook, Richard
Davenport-Hines and Andrew Marr
1965: THE YEAR MODERN
BRITAIN WAS BORN by
Christopher Bray
UK PUBLISHER Simon & Schuster
UK PUBLICATIONAugust, 2014 (Hbk)
LENGTH
336 pages
All rights available excluding UK &
Commonwealth (S&S)
There is Britain before 1965 and Britain after 1965 and they are not the same thing. 1965 was the year
Britain democratised education, it was the year pop
culture began to be taken as seriously as high art, the
time when comedians and television shows imported
the methods of modernism into their work. It was
when communications across the Atlantic became
instantaneous, the year when, for the first time in a
century, British artists took American gallery-goers
by storm. In 1965 the Beatles proved that rock and
roll could be art, it was when we went car crazy, and
craziness was held to be the only sane reaction to an
insane society. It was the year feminism went
mainstream, the year, did she but know it, that the
Thatcher revolution began, the year taboos were
talked up - and trashed. It was when racial
discrimination was outlawed and the death penalty
abolished; it marked the appointment of Roy Jenkins
as Home Secretary, who became chief architect in
legislating homosexuality, divorce, abortion and
censorship. It was the moment that our culture,
reeling from what are still the most shocking killings
of the century, realised it was a less innocent, less
spiritual place than it had been kidding itself. It was
the year of consumerist relativism that gave us the
country we live in today and the year the idea of a
home full of cultural artefacts - books, records,
magazines - was born.
It was the year when everything changed - and the
year that everyone knew it.
“... — a fascinating experience…this may be the preeminent Connery biography” Empire on SEAN
CONNERY: THE MEASURE OF A MAN (Faber & Faber, 2010)
Christopher Bray became a full-time writer in 2005 after fifteen years at the Fleet Street coal
face. He now writes about books, movies, music and paintings for the Telegraph, the FT,
the Independents, the Sunday Times, the New Statesman, the Literary Review, and the New York Times.
non-fiction
A Little History: Photographs
of Nick Cave & Cohorts,
1981-2013 by Bleddyn Butcher
PUBLISHER
PUBLICATION
LENGTH
Allen & Unwin
tbc
tbc
Bleddyn Butcher’s illustrated book of photographs, A
Little History, presents images of Nick Cave and his
associated acts from their humble beginnings in
Australia to the present day as an international
critically acclaimed headlining act. With Nick’s
backing and an introduction from Sean O’Hagan,
this will be the definitive documentation of a band
with an iconic singer whose image, cult appeal, and
downright coolness is as relevant now as it ever was.
One of rock’s few singular personalities, Nick Cave’s
indomitable influence now extends far beyond music
into the echoing realms of film and literature, while
his charismatic presence precisely informs his lyrical
imagery and dauntless performances.
Thirty-two years in the making, dazzled by Cave’s
obvious talent when first meeting him in 1981,
All rights available excluding World (Allen Butcher took it upon himself to document its
& Unwin)
headlong development. A long friendship
commenced. Bleddyn’s pointed portraits and
sneaking peeks behind the scenes dispel the
monolithic myth of the so-called “King of Goth”.
With over 100 carefully selected photographs, it will
reflect both Cave’s forbidding public persona and the
irrepressible humour that lightens his private life.
Bleddyn has included portraits of band members
from The Birthday Party, The Bad Seeds and
Grinderman as well as snapshots of backstage
encounters with the likes of John Cale and Nina
Simone, peers Shane MacGowan and Mark E Smith
and former girlfriends Anita Lane and Viviane
Carniero.
Bleddyn Butcher worked for NME throughout the 1980s, photographing musicians ranging from
Alex Chilton and Joe Strummer to REM, the Pixies and U2, as well as authors like William Gibson,
JG Ballard and James Ellroy. In 2011, he published Save What You Can: The Day of The Triffids, a
biography of that band’s prime mover David McComb. His photographic work has appeared in
most leading music journals and is included in the permanent collection at Australia’s National
Portrait Gallery in Canberra. Bleddyn now lives in Sydney, New South Wales.
non-fiction - travel/history/
politics for readers who enjoy Tim
Butcher, Paul Theroux, Rob Gifford &
William Dalrymple
THE EMPEROR FAR AWAY:
Travels at the Edge of China
by David Eimer
A revelatory and groundbreaking insight into the
divisions within modern-day China, The Emperor
Far Away exposes the dark side of the world's new
superpower.
UK PUBLISHER
PUBLICATION
LENGTH
Bloomsbury
July 2014 (Hbk)
336 pages
All rights available excluding World
(Bloomsbury)
Far from the glittering cities of Beijing and Shaghai,
China's borderlands are populated by around one
hundred million people who are not Han Chinese.
For many of these restive minorities, the old Chinese
adage 'the mountains are high and the Emperor far
away', meaning Beijing's grip on power is tenuous
and its influence unwelcome, continues to resonate.
Travelling through China's most distant and
unknown reaches, David Eimer explores the
increasingly tense relationship between the Han
Chinese and the ethnic minorities. Deconstructing
the myths represented by Beijing, Eimer reveals a
shocking and fascinating picture of a China that is
more of an empire than a country.
David Eimer was the China Correspondent for the Sunday Telegraph from 2007 to 2012, while
also working as a columnist and feature writer for the South China Morning Post in Hong Kong.
Having first visited China in 1988, he has travelled in almost every province of the country and
lived in Beijing from 2005-2012. Currently based in Bangkok, Eimer was the Daily Telegraph's
Southeast Asia Correspondent from 2012 to 2014.
non-fiction - history for readers
who enjoy Simon Winchester, Giles
Milton, Nathaniel Philbrick & Niall
Ferguson
MERCHANT
ADVENTURERS: The Voyage
of Discovery that
Transformed Tudor England
by James Evans
In the spring of 1553 three ships sailed northeast from London into uncharted waters. The scale of
their ambition was breathtaking. Drawing on the
latest navigational science and the new spirit of
enterprise and discovery sweeping the Tudor capital,
they sought a northern passage to Asia and its riches.
The success of the expedition depended on its
two leaders: Sir Hugh Willoughby, a brave gentleman
UK PUBLISHER W&N, Orion
soldier, and Richard Chancellor, a brilliant young
US PUBLISHER
Pegasus
scientist and man of the sea. When their ships
PUBLICATION
September 2014
became separated in a storm, each had to fend for
(Pbk)
himself. Their fates were sharply divided. One
LENGTH
352 pages
returned to England, to recount extraordinary tales
of the imperial court of Tsar Ivan the Terrible. The
tragic, mysterious story of the other two ships has to
All rights available excluding UK & be pieced together through the surviving captain's log
Commonwealth (Orion); USA (Pegasus)
book, after he and his crew became lost and trapped
by the advancing Arctic winter.
This long neglected endeavour was one of the
boldest in British history, and its impact was
profound. Although the 'merchant adventurers' failed
to reach China as they had hoped, their
achievements would lay the foundations for England's
expansion on a global stage. As James Evans' vivid
account shows, their voyage also makes for a gripping
story of daring, discovery, tragedy and adventure.
James Evans did his PhD at Oriel College, Oxford, following a first-class Masters in Historical
Research. He has worked as a producer on various historical television documentaries, including
Dan Cruickshank's 'Hidden Houses' (BBC2), Niall Ferguson's 'Western Civilisation' (C4), Griff Rhys
Jones's 'Rivers' (BBC1) and Michael Wood's 'English Story' (BBC2), for which he also contributed to
the accompanying book.
non-fiction - social history/
popular culture for readers who
enjoy Joe Moran, Kate Fox, Alain De
Botton & Tom Vanderblit
RUSH HOUR: How 500
Million Commuters Survive
the Daily Journey to Work
by Iain Gately
UK PUBLISHER Head of Zeus
UK PUBLICATIONOctober 2014 (Hbk)
LENGTH
320 pages
All rights available excluding UK & BC
rights and translation (Head of Zeus)
Across the world, half a billion people commute to
work daily. This 'time between' work and home is
experienced by every person with a job at some
point in their life.
Iain Gately traces the history of commuting from
the Victorian age of the steam train to the masscommuting of the present. He investigates the
contrasting experience of commuting in Britain and
around the world: from the crushed passengers of
the Tokyo metro to the millions of cyclists in China
to the road-rage prone drivers of Middle America.
Whether undertaken by car, bus, train or bicycle,
commuting shapes our days and creates a time and a
space for a surprisingly diverse range of activities.
RUSH HOUR is the first in-depth investigation of
the phenomenon and its subculture - past, present
and future.
Iain Gately was born in 1963 and brought up in Hong Kong. He studied law at Cambridge before
working in corporate finance. He is the author of several critically acclaimed books including THE
ASSESSOR, DRINK, and LA DIVA NICOTINA.
non-fiction - memoir / music
HIGH AND LOW: the
autobiography
by Morten Harket
UK PUBLISHER
DELIVERY LENGTH
tbc
August 2014
80,000 words
All rights available excluding Norway
(Forlaget Press), Germany (Edel), Brazil
(Lafonte), Poland (Anakonda)
a-ha were one of the biggest acts of the 80s and are
one of the biggest of the last 30 years, indeed, they
hold the Guinness World Record for having
performed in front of the biggest paying audience
in history. And Morten Harket is one the most
enigmatic of frontmen to have graced the bedroom
walls of countless girls (and boys alike). But
Morten's appeal isn't all about his striking good
looks and sharp cheekbones; his extraordinary
voice marked a-ha out as something unique from
the very beginning, and it's this voice which earned
another record, this time for holding the longest
note on a hit single (20.2 seconds). Morten, Magne and Paul were children of the oil
revolution in Norway and came to London
determined to make themselves notable: they had
the song writing, they ripped their jeans, sprayed
their hair up and insinuated themselves into Steve
Strange's weird and wonderful clubland. And the
rest, as they say, is history. Or rather, 40 million
album sales. That is more than the sales of Blur
and Wham! albums combined. After time out, aha made one of the most successful comebacks of
any like band and Morten continues an
internationally successful solo career. He has also
retained his good looks. ...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=djV11Xbc914
non-fiction – memoir for readers
who enjoy Nora Ephron, Rachel Cusk,
Caitlin Moran & Elizabeth Wurtzel
THE LIBERTY TREE by
Suzanne Harrington
UK PUBLISHER UK PUBLICATION
LENGTH
Atlantic
July, 2013
304 pages
All rights available excluding UK &
Commonwealth rights (Atlantic)
Suzanne Harrington did all the things that adults do,
long before she'd grown up: met Leo, married, had
babies. She also partied, was homeless for a while,
and drank - and drank. She headed towards
disintegration, with Leo at her side, locked deep in
himself. Then, waking to the wreckage of yet another
lost weekend, she stopped drinking - and Leo, her
companion and enabler, became a stranger. They
separated. Newly sober, and freed from her demons,
Suzanne embraced life. Leo chose escape. Early one
morning the police arrived. A body had been found
hanging from a tree.
When it was all over, and Suzanne had buried Leo,
and helped her children to grieve, she sat down and
wrote the story of their father's life. This is for them.
It is for the memory of Leo. It is also for anyone who
has partied too hard, found life unbearable, avoided
the truth. It is like nothing you have read before, or
will read again. It is touching, hilarious, brutally
honest and utterly compelling.
“Harrington's memoir is gripping and intense; achingly poignant and deeply, darkly funny.” –
Augusten Burroughs
“Harrington writes extremely well about the nature of alcoholism…The Liberty Tree may give
hope, and that, in part, is what books are for.” – The Observer
“A brave book…a gifted storyteller” – John Sutherland, The Times
“The book has all the hallmarks of a bestseller. It is original and unputdownable. I devoured it in
almost one sitting” – The Irish Independent
Suzanne Harrington has at various points been a journalist, TEFL teacher, a dole claimer, a
backpacker, a youth worker, a painter, a wardrobe assistant, a washer-upper, a pen pusher, a house
cleaner, a comic bagger, a market stall holder and a cake maker. She is a columnist for the Irish
Examiner and also writes for the Irish Independent, Irish Times, The Guardian, Irish Daily Mail
with syndication in Australia, Canada, South Africa and the US. She lives in Brighton.
non-fiction - memoir/ crime
for readers who enjoy John Dickie,
Roberto Saviano & Misha Glenny
THE NEGOTIATOR: MY
LIFE AT THE HEART OF
THE HOSTAGE TRADE
by Ben Lopez
UK PUBLISHER Sphere, Little, Brown
US PUBLISHER
Skyhorse
UK PUBLICATIONMay 2012 (Ppk)
US PUBLICATION August 2012 (Pbk)
LENGTH
320 pages
All rights available excluding UK &
Commonwealth (Little, Brown),
USA
( S k y h o r s e ) , I t a l y ( C a i ro E d i t o r e ) ,
Netherlands (Meulenhoff Boekerij); China
(Grand Central Publishing House), Japan
(Kashiwashobo); Poland (S.I.W. ZNAK)
Ben Lopez spends his life traveling the world,
bartering with people who value money over life.
Working for governments, law enforcement agencies,
multinational corporations and private clients, Ben is
an expert K&R (Kidnap and Ransom) consultant,
supplying professional kidnap-negotiation services.
He can be called out to anywhere in the world within
24 hours notice to set up and command the
negotiator's cell, bargaining with religious fanatics,
hardened criminals, and other desperate people in
order to save the lives of their captives. Alongside a
shadowy team of former spies and special operatives,
his arsenal of psychological techniques are just as
powerful as brute force. He'll spend as long as is
necessary to get the job done. And then he'll
disappear. This extraordinary book reads like a
thriller - but for those involved in the stories within it,
the drama, and the tension, is very real. **Shortlisted for the CWA Non-fiction Dagger**
Ben Lopez is an American by birth who has lived in the UK for 15 years. A clinical psychologist by
trade, he has worked in the K&R field for over two decades. Ben Lopez is a pseudonym - if his real
name was revealed not only would the author's career be over, but he'd never be able to travel to a
number of countries again. non-fiction - literary history
for readers who enjoy Michael Holroyd,
John Sutherland, Claire Tomalin, Simon
Callow & Peter Ackroyd
THE VAMPYRE FAMILY:
Passion, Envy and the Curse
of Byron by Andrew McConnell
Stott
In the spring of 1816, Lord Byron was the greatest
poet of his generation and the most famous man in
Britain, but his personal life was about to erupt.
Fleeing his celebrity, notoriety and debts, he sought
refuge in Europe, taking his young doctor with him.
As an inexperienced medic with literary aspirations of
his own, Dr Polidori could not believe his luck.
UK PUBLISHER Canongate
US PUBLISHER
Pegasus
UK PUBLICATION 2013
LENGTH
90,000 words
All rights available excluding World English
language rights (Canongate); USA (Pegasus)
That summer another literary star also arrived in
Geneva. With Percy Bysshe Shelley came his lover,
Mary and her step-sister Claire Clairmont. For the
next three months, this party of young bohemians
shared their lives, charged with sexual and artistic
tensions. It was a period of extraordinary creativity
from which would emerge Frankenstein, the gothic
masterpiece of Romantic fiction, Byron's Childe
Harold, Shelley's Mont Blanc, and The Vampyre by
John Polidori, the first great vampire novel.
It was also a time of remarkable drama and
emotional turmoil. For Byron and the Shelleys, their
stay by the lake would serve to immortalise them in
the annals of literary history. But for Claire and
Polidori, the Swiss sojourn would scar them forever.
Andrew Stott is the author of COMEDY (Routledge, 2005) and THE PANTOMIME LIFE OF JOSEPH
GRIMALDI (Canongate, 2009), which won the Royal Society of Literature Jerwood Prize for Non-Fiction,
the Sheridan Morley Prize for Theatre Biography, and the George Freedley Memorial Award. Grimaldi was
a BBC Radio 4 'Book of the Week,' and was named as one of the Guardian's 'Books of the Year' for 2010.
In 2010-11, he was a Fellow at the New York Public Library's Cullman Center for Scholars and Writers.
Andrew is Professor of English and Dean of Undergraduate Education at the University of Buffalo, SUNY.
non-fiction for readers who enjoy
James Herriot and Gervase Phinn
THE YORKSHIRE
SHEPHERDESS by
Amanda Owen
Amanda has been seen by millions of viewers of ITV's
The Dales living and working at Ravenseat, a hill
farm of 2,000 acres which she shares with 900 sheep,
seven children, four dogs and one husband. Not to
m e n t i o n c h i c k e n s, p i g s, c o w s, h o r s e s, a n
uncontrollable goat and a vole who has taken up
residence in the living room. And she couldn't be
happier.
UK PUBLISHER
PUBLICATION
LENGTH
Pan Macmillan
April 2014 (Hbk)
288 pages
All rights available excluding UK & BC
rights (Pan Macmillan)
Growing up in industrial Huddersfield, Amanda
wanted nothing more than to be a shepherdess. In this
delightful memoir she reveals how she achieved her
dream. She was a broke but happy contract
shepherdess when she fell for, and married, farmer
Clive Owen at Ravenseat . . . Soon she was not only
trying to fit in with the locals, but was fitting in
motherhood too. Along the way, she and Clive have
dealt with the tragedy of foot and mouth disease, the
joy of breeding a champion tup, and the challenges of
raising children in such a remote location. They live a
traditional life ruled by the seasons, from the peace of
winter, when they are cut off by snow, to spring's busy
lambing season and the backbreaking tasks of
summertime - haymaking and sheepshearing.
Funny, heart-warming and packed with unforgettable
characters - both human and animal - The Yorkshire
Shepherdess will inspire you to look at the
countryside and those who work there with new
appreciation.
Amanda Owen grew up in Huddersfield but was inspired by the James Herriot books, amongst
others, to work in farming. After learning her craft as a freelance shepherdess, cow milker and
alpaca shearer, she settled down as a farmer's wife with her own flock of sheep at Ravenseat.
Happily married and with seven children (so far), she wouldn't change a thing about her hectic but
rewarding life.
non-fiction – memoir for readers
who enjoy Tom Bower, Simon NapierBell, Nick Kent & Barney Hoskyns
LET’S MAKE LOTS OF
MONEY by Tom Watkins
UK PUBLISHER UK PUBLICATION
LENGTH
Virgin Books
Spring, 2014
TBC
All rights available excluding UK &
Commonwealth rights (Virgin)
As one of the few openly gay movers in the music
business, Tom is a pioneer with incredible tales to
tell, many of which are salacious and hilarious. The
timing feels particularly right in this post-Jimmy
Savile world where the straight music business of
the Top of the Pops era has been recast in a seedy
light. With a background studying under Terence
Conran and being responsible for the image and
album work of many an act, his latest ventures
include designing his seafront house, which was
featured on TV’s Grand Designs. Simon Cowell has
asked him to be a judge on X Factor but he has
always refused on the grounds that he got what he
wanted from music and knew when to step aside.
Now, having met his collaborating writer, he feels
ready to tell his story. He’s charismatic and
unflinching and this is bound to be a fantastic read.
He’s been working with writer Matthew Lindsay on
shaping the story. Matt writes for Quietus, amongst
other publications.
Tom Watkins was a notorious music manager and pop svengali, whose discovery and success with
the likes of the Pet Shop Boys, Bros and East 17 propelled him to the forefront of the British music
industry in the 80s and 90s. He is a notorious art collector and owns an amazing property on the
seafront in Hastings, which was the subject of TV’s Grand Designs.
non-fiction for readers who enjoy Sir
Ranulph Fiennes, Ed Stafford, Bear Grylls
and Martin Meredith
WALKING THE NILE by
Levison Wood
In November 2013, former soldier and veteran
of Afghanistan, Levison Wood will embark on one of
the last great exploration challenges known to man: to
UK PUBLISHER Simon & Schuster
walk the Nile from source to delta. His journey is
DELIVERY November 2014
4,250 miles long. He will walk every step of the way.
LENGTH
90,000 words
He will pass through rainforest, savannah, swamp,
desert and lush delta oasis. He will cross seven, very
different countries: Burundi, Rwanda, Tanzania,
All rights available excluding World Uganda, South Sudan, Sudan and Egypt.
English language rights (S&S)
A journey this ambitious was simply too
dangerous until recently. But the advent of effective
anit-malerial, relative political stability and satellite
communication finally means it is possible. Risky, but
no longer a suicide mission.
The spirit of exploration and the enduring
appeal it holds over the general public is one good
reason. It is inspiring. That it has never been done
before is another. Records are there to be broken. But
most importantly the very intimate, coal face process of
walking every step will ensure the expedition engages
with the people and landscape in a way that most big
expeditions can’t. This is as down and dirty as it gets –
and we’ll get a new and refreshing sense of Africa – not
a Joanna Lumley coffee-table book nor a John
Simpson, safari suited, disaster bulletin.
The banks of the Nile are steeped in the history
of Africa, past and present; the Arab slave routes,
great and ancient cultures lying in ruins, the story of a
continent “discovered” by the legendary Victorian
explorers and the story of a continent forging a new
future for itself and its people through democracy and
revolution – political, social and economic. Through
the people he meets and who will help him on his
journey, Lev will come face to face with the great
human story of a modern Africa emerging out of the
past..
***Part of a Major C4 and Animal planet 4-part Documentary ***
Levison Wood is a writer and photographer. His work has featured on BBC, CNN and in the
National Geographic and Forbes Magazine. In 2011 he was made a Fellow of the Royal
Geographical Society.
poetry for readers who enjoy John
Cooper Clarke, Benjamin Zephaniah,
Mike Skinner & Allen Ginsberg.
HOLD YOUR OWN by
Kate Tempest
A second collection from Kate, which will follow on
f r o m h e r s e l f - p u b l i s h e d fi r s t c o l l e c t i o n
EVERYTHING SPEAKS IN ITS OWN WAY. She
will join the amazing Picador stable which includes
Jackie Kay and Carol Ann Duffy and will be edited
by Don Paterson.
UK PUBLISHER Picador
PUBLICATION October 2014
LENGTH
TBC
All rights available except UK &
Commonwealth (Picador)
Kate Tempest grew up in South-East London, where
she still lives. Starting out as a rapper, she toured the
spoken word circuit for a number of years, and now
works as a poet and playwright. Her work includes
Balance, her first album with her band Sound of
Rum; Everything Speaks in its Own Way, a collection
of poems with a CD and DVD of live performance;
GlassHouse, a forum theatre play for homeless
theatre company Cardboard Citizens; and the plays
Wasted and Hopelessly Devoted for Paines Plough.
Brand New Ancients won the Ted Hughes Prize for
innovation in poetry, and is published by Picador. It
will tour Autumn / Winter 2013 across the UK. She
is currently working on a new collection of poems,
also to be published by Picador, a novel and a new
record with music producer Dan Carey.
‘Wow’ – Chuck D
‘Spectacular’ – John Cooper Clarke
‘She is playing not just with thoughts and verse, but with the conventions of performance itself ’ –
The Guardian
‘Absolutely breath-taking’ – Jenni Murray, BBC Women’s Hour
Kate Tempest grew up in South-East London, where she still lives. Starting out as a rapper, she toured the
spoken word circuit for a number of years, and now works as a poet and playwright. Her work includes
Balance, her first album with her band Sound of Rum; Everything Speaks in its Own Way, a collection of
poems on her own Zingaro imprint; GlassHouse, a play for Cardboard Citizens; and the Paines Plough
commissioned plays Wasted (published by Methuen) and Hopelessly Devoted. Brand New Ancients won the
Ted Hughes Prize 2013 (Kate being the only ever recipient under 40) and is published by Picador. She will
re-tour it from Edinburgh Fringe 2013 until Spring 2014 across the UK. She is currently working on a new
collection of poems (also to be published by Picador in 2014), the novel and the record.
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