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LBF: The Big Deals: Fiction

20.04.12 | The Bookseller Team

Atlantic Books editor-in-chief Ravi Mirchandani signed a deal at LBF for world rights including translation in two historical novels by début author Tim Leach from Caroline Wood at Felicity Bryan Associates. The first book, Croesus: The Last King of Lydia, is based on the writing of Greek historian Herodotus, and centres on the figure of Croesus, whose rise and fall from power shook the ancient world. Mirchandani called it “an exhilaratingly confident first novel”.

At Century, editorial director Kate Burke has snapped up UK and Commonwealth rights (excluding Canada) to a high-concept women’s fiction début, The Life List, by Lori Nelson. Burke did the deal with Rachel Kind at Random House Inc, following a multi-publisher US auction. The book follows thirtysomething Brett, who inherits a list of 10 life goals when her mother dies. Burke described it as “poignant, funny and romantic”. Arrow will publish in summer 2013.

HarperFiction has acquired three novels at auction by début novelist Tom Isbell, with publisher Kate Elton and commissioning editor Amy McCulloch buying UK and Commonwealth rights through Chandler Crawford at Chandler Crawford Agency and Victoria Sanders at Victoria Sanders & Associates. The first novel, The Hatchery, is set in a post-apocalyptic dystopian future, following a group of physically impaired boys who realise they are being raised as prey.

Meanwhile, David Godwin Associates is attracting “a lot of attention” for a début series of fantasy novels by 20-year-old Samantha Shannon. The first book in the series of seven titles, which is out on UK submission, is called The Bone Season.

Tindal Street Press senior editor Luke Brown has acquired a literary crime novel from Jon Elek at A P Watt, signing UK and Commonwealth rights at LBF. Swear Down by Russ Litten is the story of the murder of a teenage gang leader, and the two people from very different worlds who confess to it. Brown compared it to work by Richard Price and Peter Temple, and said: “It’s rare to read British crime that matches these writers’ ambition. We’ll be entering it for the major literary prizes.”

Picador has acquired UK and Commonwealth rights in the second novel by Naomi Wood, Mrs Hemingway, about each of Ernest Hemingway’s four wives. Editorial director Francesca Main signed the deal with Cathryn Summerhayes at WME. 

• London Book Fair
• Rights deal
• The Bookseller Team