Morrow wins 13-way auction as Fig Tree pre-empts Jordan Harrison's Gothic debut
Fig Tree has pre-empted a "genre-bending, Never Let Me Go meets Rebecca" debut novel from playwright and Orange Is the New Black screenwriter Jordan Harrison. North American rights, meanwhile, were won by William Morrow in a hotly contested 13-way auction.
Helen Garnons-Williams, publishing director of Fig Tree, pre-empted UK and Commonwealth rights to Miss Archer from Caspian Dennis at Abner Stein. Morrow’s vice-president and editorial director Jessica Williams won the book in the US auction from Julie Barer at The Book Group. Publication is scheduled for early 2027.
The novel, set in the present day, follows Dre Archer, the governess to a strange boy she is entrusted to raise in an isolated, Gothic mansion where all are forced to maintain the illusion that they are living in the late Victorian era. The boy, Albie, is "sensitive, rash, emotionally obtuse and possibly brilliant". He also believes the year is 1884. Everyone working in the grand home acts accordingly, striving to keep the future safely outside their doors. Dre, too, is expected to follow along and not ask questions.
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Fig Tree called Miss Archer “intensely original and page-turning literary fiction with Gothic undertones and a speculative slant", adding that it "deftly explores pressing questions about Artificial Intelligence, individual freedom, creative genius and, above all, what it means to be human”.
Garnons-Williams added that Harrison’s book was an "audacious debut: a brilliantly inventive, playfully profound literary adventure where there are surprises around every corner."
New York-based Harrison has had almost 20 plays produced since his initial full-length offering, Kid-Simple, launched in 2004, shortly after his graduation from Brown University’s creative writing program. His breakthough came with 2014’s Marjorie Prime, which was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. The play was later adapted for the big screen and starred Jon Hamm, Geena Davis and Tim Robbins. Harrison’s other accolades include a Guggenheim Fellowship and the Horton Foote Prize for Best New American Play. He worked for three seasons as writer and producer of Netflix’s Orange Is the New Black, and other credits include GLOW and Dispatches from Elsewhere.
Harrison said he was excited to be at Fig Tree, "the home of some of my favourite contemporary authors, including Ferdia Lennon and Claire Fuller. I wrote Miss Archer without knowing if anyone would ever read it apart from me and my husband, so it is a ‘pinch-me moment’ to find readers in another country".
