HarperCollins Children's wins four-way auction to Charlotte Durance's debut

HarperCollins Children’s Books has won a "tense" four-way auction to Charlotte Durance’s debut picture book, in a four-book deal.

World rights for four books were acquired by Alice Blacker, publishing director, picture books at HarperCollins Children’s Books from Neil Dunnicliffe at Spring Literary Agency.

Blacker and picture books art director, Candice Turvey, discovered Charlotte’s artwork on the first day of the 2025 Bologna Book Fair and, keen to sign her, they immediately sought her out. With its "vibrant mixed media art, coupled with Charlotte’s distinctive style", Ready Steady Go will publish in March 2027.

She was previously a finalist at the Bologna Children’s Book Fair Illustrators Exhibition in 2024 and 2025, and the Portfolio Award in 2025. A recent graduate from the MA in Children’s Book Illustration at Cambridge School of Art, she won the Batsford Prize for Children’s Illustration, a Communication Arts Award of Excellence in 2024 and was highly commended in the Macmillan Prize for Illustration in 2025.

Durance said: “It is so brilliant to be working with the team at HarperCollins. Ready Steady Go started as a play project that I made on my MA and I’m really excited to see these characters out in the world."

Blacker said: “Charlotte Durance’s work and approach is so dazzling and so original. Her ideas, her artwork and colours – it all feels incredibly refreshing. She’s a future star and we can’t wait to see her take the picture book world by storm.”