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West Midlands-based Tindal Street Press has scooped up two well-established authors in "significant" acquisitions as some of the larger publishers look to trim back their midlist in light of the downturn.
Tindal has signed a one-book deal for four figures with Lesley Glaister for her new novel Relatives in America via A M Heath agent Bill Hamilton.
She has previously had nine books published by Bloomsbury, but has already edited an anthology of short stories called Are You She? for Tindal Street.
Publisher Alan Mahar said: "She fits in well with us culturally as she writes from a regional perspective—the main difference is that she’s an established name. So our job is to find more readers for her."
Relatives in America revolves around a young woman’s attempts to extricate her brother from a hippy cult in America.
Mahar said Tindal Street expects to sell 10,000 copies "which, when you think we can only hope for 1,000 or so on books by unknown authors, is big for us".
The publisher, funded by Arts Council England, also signed Richard Francis for his next book Old Spring, snapping him up from his former publisher Fourth Estate via United Agents’ Caroline Dawnay.
The novel, which tells the story of "the haunted lives of staff and customers in a West Country pub", is due out next year. Mahar described Francis as "a champion of the regional novel" saying this made him "a perfect fit" for Tindal Street.
He said: "It’s partly down to the economy that we are able to get these names. Agents are seeing people like us as viable alternatives—we’re looking more reputable as the bigger houses cut back on their midlists. On our list, they’ll be the top names. We’re reaping the benefits."