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Hutchinson Heinemann will publish Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist Richard Powers’ next book about the lives of four people on an island in French Polynesia, Playground, as well reissuing his backlist.
Ailah Ahmed, publishing director, acquired UK and Commonwealth rights, excluding Canada, from Peter Straus at RCW acting on behalf of Melanie Jackson at the Melanie Jackson Agency. Hutchinson Heinemann will publish in September 2024.
The publisher said said: “Playground follows four lives – a marine biologist, an artist, a schoolteacher, and an AI pioneer – that intersect on an island in French Polynesia when it is chosen as a base for seasteading [creating permanent dwellings at sea], humanity’s next great adventure.”
In addition to the new novel, Hutchinson Heinemann will reissue Powers’ backlist over the next two years, including The Overstory (Cornerstone), which won the the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 2019.
Ahmed says: “Playground contains so many emotional currents. It shows us how a friendship can destroy itself but still manage to change the world. It also teaches us so much about what lies beneath our oceans. This is an astounding novel from a master.”
Powers has published 14 novels. He is a MacArthur Fellow and received the National Book Award. He lives in the Great Smoky Mountains which rise along the border between Tennessee and North Carolina.