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Canongate rounds up best of Coren

02.10.08 Catherine Neilan

Scottish independent Canongate is running a high-profile PR campaign for an anthology of writing from journalist and satirist Alan Coren, edited by his son Giles and daughter Victoria and due out on 13th October.

Entitled Chocolate and Cuckoo Clocks: The Essential Alan Coren, the book spans his 40-year career in humorous writing, and features introductions to each decade by Melvyn Bragg, Stephen Fry, A A Gill, Clive James and Victoria Wood. The title refers to Coren's famous joke that cuckoo clocks were invented because chocolate and snow—Switzerland's other national products—melted.

Coren, who was suffering from cancer, died last year of a rare skin disease following an insect bite. He was well known as a team captain on the BBC's word game "Call My Bluff", a panellist on Radio 4's "News Quiz" and as editor of Punch magazine; he worked prolifically for many other publications too, and wrote more than 20 books.

Canongate highlighted Coren's claim that he had published "six million words, or 10 copies of War and Peace".

Anya Serota, Canongate's editorial director, called Coren "a national treasure", adding: "[He was] a wonderfully warm and funny writer whose writing feels as fresh now as it was when he first wrote it. "When Vicky and Giles Coren proposed the idea of a selected edition of the best of his writing, we all immediately wanted a copy—always a good sign." The book will be published in hardback at £20.

As well as TV and radio interviews, and a "high-profile PR campaign targeting all national ­newspapers for features and reviews", Canongate said there would be a ­ two-part serialisation of the book in the Times on 4th and 6th October, and it will be BBC Radio 4's "Book of the Week" from 6th October.

The Times will run archive footage of Coren online, and the Daily Mail will run a piece by Victoria.
Both Giles and Victoria will be appearing at the Cheltenham Literature Festival on 18th October.

Next year also sees Canongate publish For Richer for Poorer, a poker memoir by Victoria, who won the 2006 European Poker Championship, in  which she tries to unearth what makes poker the world's most popular card game. The hardback, which is due out in May, will retail for £16.99.

Book Canongate Alan Coren Catherine Neilan

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