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Fourth Estate has paid a "decent five-figure sum" for a graphic novel series that is being adapted into a film by "Shaun of the Dead" director and co-writer Edgar Wright.
The Scott Pilgrim series by Bryan Lee O'Malley will be published early next year. Editor Mark Richards bought UK and Commonwealth rights, excluding Canada, from Lauren Pearson at Regal Literary.
The book is about the eponymous hero, a 20-something slacker who spends his life playing video games and bass guitar in an indie-rock band, who meets and falls for roller-skating courier Ramona Flowers. In order to go out with her, he must defeat her seven evil ex-boyfriends.
Richards said: "It's really about a bunch of friends in their 20s hanging out, falling in love and playing in bands. It's very smart, funny and pop culturally literate."
He described the appeal as similar to Wright's Channel 4 sitcom "Spaced", which he co-wrote with actor Simon Pegg.
"It's the wit and personality of the books that really got me. The dialogue is funny and smart but also weirdly true. It's not your typical comic book," said Richards. "It was very funny, well observed and well drawn."
Publication details have yet to be finalised. Richards said the publisher is likely to release the first three titles in the six-book series in January or February 2010. The remaining three will be released in April, when the final one is published in the US.
The movie adaptation, entitled "Scott Pilgrim vs the World", will follow in summer 2010. It will star "Juno" and "Superbad" actor Michael Cera as Scott Pilgrim. Richards said the publisher had not yet decided whether the books will be repackaged as movie tie-ins.