Bloomsbury pre-empts Melissa Albert’s 'dazzling' debut adult novel

Bloomsbury has acquired The Children, the first adult novel from bestselling YA author Melissa Albert.

Publishing director Emma Herdman pre-empted UK and Commonwealth and audio rights to the “unsettling” speculative literary novel about the price we pay for making and consuming art, and the intergenerational cost of legacy, from Anna Webber at AM Heath in a two-book deal, on behalf of Bill Clegg of The Clegg Agency.

Clegg sold US and Canadian rights to Jessica Williams at William Morrow, the imprint of HarperCollins. Bloomsbury Trade and William Morrow will publish The Children in hardback, e-book and audiobook in July 2026 with an extensive marketing and publicity campaign.

The Children follows Guinevere as she prepares for publication of her upcoming memoir about her life as the daughter of Edith Sharpe, the late author of a worldwide phenomenon: the Ninth City fantasy series, whose main characters were inspired by Guinevere and her brother. Their magical childhood with their actor-turned-artist father and a mother who loved them enough to immortalise them was a blissful, bohemian affair. At least, this is the story that Guin is about to present to the world.

Now estranged from her brother, her parents long-dead after a devastating fire, strange events threaten the veneer of serenity Guin works hard to project, the synopsis continues. Her brother, a notorious, secretive artist, announces a new installation simply entitled Mother. And Guin can’t help but worry that the truth behind their idyllic childhood is about to surface and blow her world apart… but is the truth one she ever really knew?

Told in alternating narratives between 1990s Vermont and present-day New York, The Children is described as a twisting narrative of family secrets and long-held resentments, which asks whether we can ever really exorcise the ghosts of a childhood forsaken in favour of a parent’s artistic vision.

Herdman said: “I could read this dazzling novel 100 times and still find something new to admire. The Children is an adventure in storytelling and imagination, rich with the tangles and possibilities of art, family and creation. We are so honoured to be welcoming Melissa to the Bloomsbury Trade list, and look forward to the fun we’ll have publishing this novel with the team at William Morrow.”

Brooklyn-based Melissa Albert is the New York Times and indie bestselling author of The Bad Ones and Our Crooked Hearts, and The Hazel Wood series (Penguin). Her work has been translated into more than 20 languages and included in the New York Times list of notable children’s books.

Albert said: “I’m thrilled to be working with an editor and team who share my love for genre-inflected storytelling, and to join a list including such legends as Susanna Clarke and Madeline Miller.”