The Bookseller.com

4th July 2009

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Tallack sets up literary agency

05.02.08 Hannah Davies

Peter Tallack, literary agent and director at Conville & Walsh, is leaving the company after six years to set up his own operation. The new agency and consultancy, to be launched next week, will be called The Science Factory and will focus on popular science. Most of Tallack's authors at Conville & Walsh, who include Ian Stewart, Arthur I. Miller, Paul Parsons, Paul Mason and Simon Ings, intend to join him in his new venture.

Prior to becoming an agent at Conville & Walsh, Tallack was science publishing director at Weidenfeld & Nicolson for three years, commissioning and editing popular science titles. Before that he worked in the editorial department of the science journal Nature for ten years.

Tallack said: “I’ve thoroughly enjoyed working at Conville & Walsh, and have tremendous admiration and affection for everyone there. But the time has come for me to strike out on my own and concentrate on my first love-the promotion of great thinkers and big ideas.”

The Science Factory, based in Tiverton, Devon, will also represent authors of other general non-fiction including history and current affairs, along with the occasional novelist. Additionally it aims to provide science media consultancy and editorial services and publish its own book titles.

Patrick Walsh and Clare Conville, founding directors of Conville & Walsh, said: “We’ll be very sad indeed to see him go, but we’re the last people to stand in the way of love and family. Peter has made a terrific contribution to this agency, and we wish him every success as he now divides his life between Devon and London in England and Hamburg in Germany. And who knows, perhaps we can sell him a book if he starts his new publishing programme?”

Tallack, who will now spend two-thirds of his time working out of London and the rest in Devon and Hamburg, follows in the footsteps of Kevin Conroy Scott, who left A P Watt to set up agency Tibor Jones & Associates, and Patrick Janson-Smith, who left the Christopher Little literary Agency to set up his own agency last November.

Conville & Walsh Peter Tallack literary agency Hannah Davies