Friday, August 21, 2009

New Books On the Way....

From Publishers Lunch Weekly:

FICTION...
DEBUT:

Volume rights to Shane Jones' LIGHT BOXES, a short novel about a small town that wages war against February that was just optioned by Spike Jonze (who is collaborating with Jones on the screenplay), to Tom Roberge at Penguin, by Bill Clegg at William Morris Endeavor (NA).
UK rights to Simon Prosser at Hamish Hamilton, in a pre-empt.

Stegner Fellow and Stanford/UCSF creative writing professor Alice LaPlante's TURN OF MIND, pitched as having a Patricia Highsmith-esque mystery at its heart, in which the narrator, a brilliant surgeon with Alzheimer's-related dementia, is suspected of killing a neighbor who was her best friend and most worthy adversary, to Morgan Entrekin and Elisabeth Schmitz at Grove/Atlantic, for publication in Winter 2011, by Victoria Skurnick at the Levine Greenberg Literary Agency (world).
Foreign rights to Goldmann in Germany and Orlando in Holland, in pre-empts. ahundley@groveatlantic.com

David Hilton's KINGS OF COLORADO, in which a man reflects back on his childhood when, at age 13, he stabbed his abusive father in the chest and was sentenced to two years at a boys reformatory ranch in Colorado, where corruption was the norm, and troubled boys learned to fend for themselves as they cared for and broke wild horses that were just as willful and untamed as the boys themselves, to Kerri Kolen at Simon & Schuster, at auction, by Laney Katz Becker at Folio Literary Management (NA).

THRILLER:

Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and author of the Ethan Gage historical fiction series (NAPOLEON'S PYRAMIDS, THE ROSETTA KEY, THE DAKOTA CIPHER), William Dietrich's next two novels, THE SHAMBHALA IMPERATIVE, alternating between the 1930s and the present, combining occult Nazi theories, neo-Nazis and contemporary science elements in an adventure revolving around a government conspiracy, and another novel continuing the adventures of 19th century American adventurer Ethan Gage, again to Rakesh Satyal at Harper, by Andrew Stuart at The Stuart Agency (world).

NON-FICTION:
ADVICE/RELATIONSHIPS...

Michelle Cove's SHAKE UP THE FAIRYTALE!, a guide that helps single women deal with all stages of "singlehood" and gives them the tools they need to navigate through a changing culture and social order that is still based on "couples," while reassuring single women that happily-ever-after is a lifelong approach to nourishing their sense of well-being, to Gabrielle Moss at Tarcher, at auction, for publication in Fall 2010, by Laney Katz Becker at Folio Literary Management (world English).

BIOGRAPHY:

Professor of French at Boston University Elizabeth Goldsmith's THE CARDINAL'S NIECES, on the adventures of Marie and Hortense Mancini, privileged sisters raised in the court of Louis XIV who fled their husbands and children to travel throughout Europe, gaining notoriety for their roles as gamblers, cross-dressers, mistresses to various kings, and pioneering women writers, to Lindsay Jones at Public Affairs, for publication in Fall 2011, by Erika Storella at The Gernert Company (world).

BUSINESS/INVESTING/FINANCE:

Retiring Los Angeles chief of police William J. Bratton's business book about the strategic importance of collaboration in today's networked world, co-authored by management expert Zachary Tumin, to Roger Scholl at Broadway Business, for publication in spring 2011, by Alice Martell of Alice Martell Agency.

HISTORY/POLITICS/CURRENT AFFAIRS:

Yale historian and author of The Dynamite Club John Merriman's THE PARIS COMMUNE OF 1871, the first account for the general reader of the dramatic uprising in which the working class of Paris took up arms against the French government, inspiring Marx, Engels and Bakunin at the time and later Trotsky, Lenin, and Mao as a model of the 'dictatorship of the proletariat,' to Lara Heimert at Basic, in a pre-empt, to Melissa Chinchillo at Fletcher & Company (NA).

Samuel Johnson Prize-winning historian Antony Beevor's one-volume history of World War II, to Geoff Shandler at Little, Brown and Weidenfeld & Nicolson in the UK, for publication in 2012, by Andrew Nurnberg at Andrew Nurnberg Associates (world English).

Marie Claire editor Yael Kohen's WE KILLED: The History of Women in American Comedy, a first-ever oral history of women in American comedy, constructed from interviews with more than 50 of the nation's most prominent female comedians, recounting the trials, tribulations, and thrills of being a woman in the male-dominated comedy world from the 1950s to present, to Sarah Crichton at Sarah Crichton Books, at auction, by David Kuhn of Kuhn Projects (NA).

SCIENCE:

Science policy expert Roger Pielke, Jr.'s NO REGRETS: A Common-Sense Approach to Climate Change, an important look at how to get our response to climate change back on track after more than a decade of failure, to T.J. Kelleher at Basic, in a nice deal, for publication in Fall 2010, by Kris Dahl at ICM (World).

24-year-old Brown grad Brian Christian's book about artificial intelligence and communication framed as an inquiry into what makes us human, to Bill Thomas at Doubleday, at auction, by Janet Silver at Zachary Shuster Harmsworth Literary Agency.

GENERAL/OTHER:

Former Nation editor and regular Harper's contributor JoAnn Wypijewski's untitled book on class in America, a cross-country road trip (pitched as in the merged spirits of de Tocqueville, What's the Matter with Kansas? and On the Road) to get at the heart of the strained-and-cracking class structure that defines and divides America, to Eric Chinski at Farrar, Straus, by Bill Clegg at William Morris Endeavor (NA).

Kevin Birmingham's THE MOST DANGEROUS MASTERPIECE, an account of the writing of James Joyce's Ulysses and the subsequent fight over its publication, with appearances by Ernest Hemingway, Sylvia Beach, Nora Barnacle, the obsessed censor Anthony Comstock, and the devilishly crafty Bennett Cerf, to Nick Trautwein at the Penguin Press, for publication in Fall 2012, by Suzanne Gluck at William Morris Endeavor.

Wrap...

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