BOOKS: FICTION

Agents' initials follow each client's entry

JUDITH ALLNATT
Judith Allnatt is a teacher who lives in rural Northamptonshire with her young family. She is a published poet and teaches creative writing at the Open University and at Leicester University. She is now at work on her third novel, set during the First World War. Her writing has been compared to that of Rose Tremain, Helen Dunmore and Tim Pears

http://www.judithallnatt.co.uk/

THE POET'S WIFE

It is 1841 and Patty is married to John Clare: poet, genius and madman. She finds her husband sitting, footsore and weary, on the side of the road near their village. He has absconded from an asylum in Essex, where she thought him well cared for, and tramped eighty miles to get home. When she takes his hands he fails to recognise her. Patty’s joy at their reunion turns to dismay as she finds that John has not returned to find her. He is searching for his childhood sweetheart, Mary Joyce, to whom he thinks he is married. Patty breaks the news to him that Mary died several years ago, but it’s clear that John does not believe her.

As their eldest daughter prepares for the birth of her first child, Patty remembers her own early marriage: their ecstatic, whirlwind courtship, the poems John wrote for her, their shared affinity with the land. She must persuade herself that this turbulent, unhappy soul is still the brilliant man she married, and help him get well again.

How far will love stretch when a loved one changes beyond recognition?

UK Publisher: Black Swan, March 2010

A MILE OF RIVER

Shortlisted for the 2008 Portico Prize for Literature and BBC Radio 5 Live Book of the Month

It is 1976 and England is suffocating. The long, dry spring has given way to a summer of severe drought, with standpipes in the streets and a rallying cry to ‘save water, share a bath!’ For the farmers, life has become a daily struggle to make ends meet. The fields are tinder dry, the earth is dusty and scorched and the rivers are drying up to a trickle.

Jess and Tom live on a remote farm in the English countryside with their increasingly difficult and brutal father, Henry. Their mother, Sylvie, walked out years before and Jess is struggling with the role of mother figure to Tom, as well as skivvie and hired hand for her father. Jess just wants to be a normal teenager, to go to dances and kiss boys, to take her exams and dream of a future far away from milking cows and ploughing fields. Daydreaming about her mother’s return, Jess discovers Sylvie’s old diary and begins to uncover the shocking truth about her disappearance.

As the drought grips ever tighter, as the water level of the river begins to drop, the menace in the air builds until it reaches boiling point, with a confrontation between Jess and her father that has devastating consequences

‘A novel of rare insight, exquisitely written. A standing ovation for this debut.’
Michael Morpurgo

UK Publisher: Doubleday/Black Swan, March 2008

Rights sold: Holland
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CAMPBELL ARMSTRONG
Campbell Armstrong was born in Glasgow in 1944. After receiving his BA from the University of Sussex Campbell migrated to the United States where he lived with his wife and children for twenty years initially teaching creative writing and then becoming a full-time novelist. He produced 20 bestselling novels before deciding to return to Europe in 1991. He now lives and writes in the Republic of Ireland.

BUTCHERS
Lou Perlman, officially on sick leave from the Strathclyde Police, has hit the lowest point in his life. Barred from participating in the investigation of the bloody gangland slayings that have shocked Glasgow, and seemingly abandoned by Miriam, the nomadic object of his affection, he’s a man without much of a future…Until the day when he decides to clean his long-neglected house and discovers, stuffed between yellowing old newspapers, a decayed human hand in a Ziploc bag…Whose hand is this? And who cut if off? And who put it in Perlman’s bedroom? These are questions he alone must answer, and they take him on a baffling quest through the strata of Glasgow society, from slum tenements to casinos to New Age Temples and high-flying criminals and freaks… the answers, when they come, prove to be more troubling than the questions.

UK publisher: Allison & Busby, 2006

Praise for WHITE RAGE...
“Armstrong’s skill is not just an eye for a criminally good tale but a passion for the people that will populate it.”
The Scotsman

Already published: JIG, MAZURKA, MAMBO, AGENTS OF DARKNESS, CONCERT OF GHOSTS, JIGSAW, HEAT, THE SURGEON’S DAUGHTER, BLACKOUT, SILENCER, THE TRADERS WIFE, THE BAD FIRE, THE LAST DARKNESS, WHITE RAGE.

Previous foreign sales in: USA, France, Germany, Poland, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Norway, Sweden, Spain.

"The thinking man's thriller writer ... Armstrong's novels are unusually supple in their writing, elegiac and lyrical...The hard-boiled writing of Chandler and Hammett runs through his work." Sunday Times

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GEMMA BURGESS
Gemma Burgess grew up in Hong Kong. She moved to London after university to pursue a career in advertising, working as a copywriter for companies like Virgin Atlantic, The Body Shop and Barclays. She currently works as a freelance copywriter. ‘The Dating Sabbatical’ is her first novel. She's now at work on her second novel, 'Everything I know I learned from Jilly Cooper'.

THE DATING SABATICAL

After one painful break-up too many, what could be more appealing than to give up on men altogether? The Dating Sabbatical starts as a drunken joke but becomes a satisfying way of life: it's protection from future heartbreak and an oddly euphoric confidence booster. And men seem much more interested… especially Jake, the irritatingly attractive cousin of one of her old university friends.

In these desperate days of redundancies, repossession and no bonuses, the heroine and her friends are finding that the streets of London are not paved with Louboutins after all. But adventures hide in unexpected places - there’s imaginary speedskating with Australians in West London pubs, lethal cocktails at all-night parties, triumphs over work frenemies and the joy of window shopping in the sunshine... Just because there's no sex in this city, or any money for that matter, doesn't mean life can't be just about perfect.

Or does it? A weekend party in the country – including the irresistible Jake – could be the make or break of The Dating Sabbatical. The question is: will she give up everything she's achieved on the Dating Sabbatical... and risk heartache again?

UK Publisher: Avon, December 2009

Foreign Rights Sold: Germany

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VICOUS CIRCLE

Felix Castor knows how to deal with the dead. It's the living who piss him off...
Castor has reluctantly returned to exorcism after the case of the Bonnington Archive ghost convinced him that he really can do some good with his abilities ('good', of course, being a relative term when dealing with the undead). But his friend, Rafi, is still possessed: the succubus, Ajulutsikael (Juliet to her friends), still technically has a contract on him; and he's still - let's not beat around the bush - dirt poor.

.... and when Satanists, sacrifice farms, stolen spirits and possessed churches all appear on the same police report, the name of Felix Castor can't be too far behind.

DEAD MEN'S BOOTS

Carey is a master plotter. His plots are focused and well planned though with enough clues that you mentally kick yourself when you start to see the connections.’

‘It’s a great read. You can’t help yourself from wanting to know how deep in shit Castor can go before he drowns.’ Next Read

THICKER THAN WATER

Old ghosts of different kinds come back to haunt Fix, in the fourth gripping Felix Castor novel. Names and faces he thought he'd left behind in Liverpool resurface in London, bringing Castor far more trouble than he'd anticipated. Childhood memories, family traumas, sins old and new, and a council estate that was meant to be a modern utopia until it turned into something like hell ...these are just some of the sticks life uses to beat Felix Castor with as things go from bad to worse for London's favourite freelance exorcist. See, Castor's stepped over the line this time, and he knows he'll have to pay; the only question is: how much? Not the best of times, then, for an unwelcome confrontation with his holier-than-thou brother, Matthew. And just when he thinks things can't possibly get any worse, along comes Father Gwillam and the Anathemata. Oh joy ...

A fifth book in the series has been commissioned

UK Publisher: Little Brown, October 2008

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GLENN CHANDLER
Glenn Chandler is best known as the creator and writer of the award-winning TAGGART television series which continues to be made and screened world-wide.

JANET SKESLIEN CHARLES
Originally from Montana, Janet Skeslien Charles currently lives in Paris, where she leads writing workshops at the Left Bank bookshop Shakespeare & Company. Moonlight in Odessa was inspired by her two years as a Soros Fellow in Odessa, Ukraine. This is her debut novel.

MOONLIGHT IN ODESSA
A Short History of Tractors in Ukrainian meets Desperate Housewives in this brilliant expose of the booming business of e-mail order brides, an industry where love and marriage collide with sex and commerce.

Odessa, Ukraine is the humour capital of the former Soviet Union. But in an upside down world where waiters earn more than doctors and Odessans depend on the mafia rather than the government for basics like phone service, no one is laughing. After months of job hunting, Daria finds a plum position at a foreign firm. But every plum has a pit. In this case, it’s her new boss, Mr. Harmon, who makes it clear that sleeping with him is part of the job description. Daria evades Harmon’s advances by recruiting her neighbour, the slippery Olga, to be his mistress. But soon Olga sets her sights on Daria’s job.

Daria begins to moonlight as an interpreter at Soviet Unions™, a matchmaking agency that organizes social events where lonely American men can meet Odessan women. Her grandmother pushes Daria to marry one of the foreigners, but Daria already has feelings for a local. She must choose between her world and America, between Vlad, a sexy, irresponsible mobster, and Tristan, a teacher nearly twice her age. Daria chooses security and America. Only it’s not exactly what she thought it would be…

Praise for MOONLIGHT IN ODESSA:

‘..a comically touching travelogue through the international romantic wasteland..’ Dave Boling, author of Guernica

‘A delightful journey from post-Soviet Ukraine to the world of rural suburban California and a vivid glimpse into the lives of “email-order” brides.’ Timothy Ryback, author of Hitler’s Private Library

‘The teetering dance between humour and heartbreak burns through this tale that takes place at the intersection of love and money, East and West, male and female’ Publishers Weekly

UK & US Publisher: Bloomsbury, September 2009 (US); January 2010 (UK)

Foreign rights sold: USA, Serbia, Romania, Sweden, Iceland, Germany, Holland, Brazil, Italy

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OUT OF THE DAWN LIGHT
First in a new series

England, 1087. On her sister’s wedding day, Lassair meets an attractive and enigmatic stranger who brings a breath of the fascinating outside world to her backwater Fenland village. When he asks Lassair to use her unique talents to help locate a mysterious treasure she accepts, despite the dangers. But this is no ordinary treasure hunt; the object of the perilous search is five hundred years old and has a terrifying power of its own . . .

‘A worthy heir to Ellis Peters’ Poison in the Pen

UK Publisher: Severn House, May 2009

ELIZABETH DARRELL
The fourth in A MAX RYDAL military mystery series by the author of many popular novels including UNSUNG HEROES and THAT SWEET AND SAVAGE LAND. Elizabeth Darrell, who also writes as Emma Drummond, lives in Bournemouth. She was an army officer before she became a full-time writer, and draws on this experience in this crime series, which has the unusual setting of a British military base in Germany

FRENCH LEAVE

During an intense heatwave, members of the West Wiltshire Regiment are engaged in a demanding military exercise prior to deployment to Afghanistan. At the conclusion of a mock assault on the final day, Private John Smith is missing. Subsequent searches of the vast exercise area fail to find him, and fears grow for his survival in such excessive temperatures without adequate water. While Smith's sergeant is adamant the man has gone AWOL, 26 Section, Special Investigation Branch, receives an anonymous phone call: Don't bother looking for Smith. Someone's finally done him in. Military detectives Max Rydal and Tom Black soon discover Smith was universally despised, which leaves them with an entire platoon of suspects...until Dan Farley, the new Platoon Commander, also goes missing. What is the link between this young lieutenant, and a squaddie who appears to have been in league with a local German crime syndicate? Have they both gone AWOL, or is there something sinister behind their disappearance?

UK: Severn House July 2009

Already published: UNSUNG HEROES, SCARLET SHADOWS, THE BURNING LAND, THE RICE DRAGON, BEYOND ALL FRONTIERS, FORGET THE GLORY, THE BRIDGE OF A HUNDRED DRAGONS, A CAPTIVE FREEDOM, SOME FAR ELUSIVE DAWN, THAT SWEET AND SAVAGE LAND, A QUESTION OF HONOUR, A DISTANT HERO, AND IN THE MORNING, AT THE GOING DOWN OF THE SUN, WE WILL REMEMBER,SHADOWS OVER THE SUN, RUSSIAN ROULETTE, CHINESE PUZZLE, CZECH MATE, DUTCH COURAGE

Praise for previous Elizabeth Darrell titles:
‘Well crafted ...a memorable, full-blooded historical’ Publishers Weekly on WE WILL REMEMBER
fascinating account of a little-appreciated branch of the armed forces’ Booklist on UNSUNG HEROES

Previous foreign sales in: USA, Italy, Norway, Poland, France, Russia

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A GENTLEMAN OF FORTUNE

A second novel featuring Dido, set in the style and period of Jane Austen.

Dido is called in to investigate the mysterious disappearance of one of the neighbours – and in doing so, discovers far more about the community than she’d ever dreamed. A fascinating and lively novel.

UK Publisher: Allison & Busby, May 2009

A MOMENT OF SILENCE

A realistic, engrossing mystery novel in the style and period of Jane Austen.

All single women must earn their keep by looking after other members of the family when necessary. Dido’s niece Catherine is at the home of her fiancé preparing for the wedding, when he suddenly disappears, having received a mysterious message. Naturally, she’s broken-hearted, not sure if he’ll ever return, so she calls for her favourite aunt to comfort her. Dido has just arrived at Belsfield Hall when the body of a girl is found within the grounds of the house. The astute Dido must uncover the identity of the dead woman and the cause of her murder before she can attempt to rescue her niece’s happiness.

A second book featuring Dido has now been commissioned.

UK Publisher: Alisson & Busby, June 2008

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LOSER'S TOWN
Private investigator David Spandau is called to the trailer of a Hollywood star, who’s receiving death threats. However, this is nothing unusual for an A-list actor. What makes this different?

It turns out the actor’s being blackmailed by B-list gangster Richie Stella, who just wants to make a movie, and you can’t make a movie without a star.

While David works on stopping Richie, he’s surprised when the lonely Bobby tries to befriend him. Bobby’s got everything, except someone who will talk honestly to him.

Potts, an operative for Richie Stella, is saddled with a working partner who’s content as a child with a chainsaw movie or a porn magazine, while Potts has a persistent feeling the sky is about to fall. Falling in love with a woman at a supermarket is the last thing he expects.

Salvatore Locatelli, the man who really owns Los Angeles, has diversified into funding movies. Well, as the head of organised crime there, you invest in the local industry, don’t you? But as he says, the movie business makes the cocaine and heroin racket look like child’s play.

This delicious novel manages to have both heart and cynicism in equal measure, as well as telling a great story. Daniel has been commissioned for a further book featuring David Spandau, set at the Cannes Film Festival called Babylon Nights. His background as a scriptwriter and film producer bring authenticity and an insider’s eye to this book.

‘The novel sparkles… . If the author continues to create such vivid characters, this series will draw a loyal following.’ Booklist

‘Depp creates characters as memorable as some of Elmore Leonard’s…. Loser’s Town wins on every count. It’s cynical, sexy, funny and suspenseful. All good things.’ Daily News (New York)

UK Publisher: Simon & Schuster, March 2009

Foreign sales: USA, Canada, France, Hungary, Germany, Russia, Holland

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KATE DUNN

Kate comes from a long line of writers and actors: her grandfather, Hugh Williams, was a celebrated actor and playwright and her uncles are the actor Simon Williams and the poet Hugo Williams. Kate followed her family into the theatre and has performed in repertory and in the West End. She has appeared in television productions including My Brother Jonathon and The Bill. Her career changed with the birth of her son Jack and the publication of her first novel REBECCA'S CHILDREN by Barrie and Jenkins. This was followed by the publication of ALWAYS AND ALWAYS, the Wartime Letters of Hugh and Margaret Williams, edited by Kate, published by John Murray and broadcast on Radio 4. In October 1998 John Murray issued EXIT THROUGH THE FIREPLACE - The Great Days of Rep and the sequel to this, DO NOT ADJUST YOUR SET – The Early Days of Live Television, was published in 2003. Kate now broadcasts on Radios Two, Three and Four and is a regular contributor to Front Row. She teaches creative writing at Bristol University and has just finished a novel, THE THINGS YOU DO FOR LOVE, for which she has received a grant from Arts Council England.

Praise for Exit Through the Fireplace

‘Many of the stories made me laugh out loud.’ Charles Spencer, The Sunday Telegraph.

Praise for Always and Always
"Kate Dunn has edited this collection faultlessly. Generally unobtrusive, she is always on hand when needed to guide us." Charles Duff, The Spectator

WHERE WOMEN SING

The first scene – which takes place early in WW2 - is absolutely wonderful and harrowing and draws you into the heart of the novel in the most thrilling way. The two protagonists, Ifor and Ella, are from different social worlds: he is a gardener, she is the mistress of a grand house and of course there can be nothing between them. Yet their story sets the scene for a present-day love affair which is equally unlikely and ultimately equally tragic. The setting is Ella’s house in Wales, called Nanagalan which in Welsh means WHERE WOMEN SING, hence the title. Now fallen into disrepair and its once beautiful garden and vineyard long abandoned and overgrown, Ella’s great nephews bring in a disparate group of experts and volunteers to try to restore it to its former glory. But the house has long buried secrets which should not be uncovered…

The obvious comparison for WHERE WOMEN SING is Ian McEwan for the twists in relationships and plot and with Elizabeth Jane Howard for its sweep across generations in a great house.

UK and Foreign Rights available

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SOME OTHER EDEN

A tempestuous, sweeping story of love, betrayal, memory, of a way of life under threat and a mistaken belief in paradise.

Bella has lived at Marshwood House, deep in the English countryside, nearly all her life. Now the building is neglected and falling down and her family is pressurizing her to move out. Only her granddaughter, Isla, understands Bella’s attachment to the house, for she spent most of her childhood there. The house has witnessed elegant parties, a wartime hospital, the creation of a beautiful garden now strangled by ivy and bindweed, and most importantly it has witnessed love: during the War, between Bella and dashing French pilot, Louis, and more recently between Isla and her teenage sweetheart, Jack. Bella has never forgotten the pain of losing Louis and she cannot bear to see her granddaughter trapped in an unhappy marriage to overbearing, workaholic Richard. She longs for Ilsa to find the happiness which eluded her, and when Jack comes back to Dorset after many years abroad it seems that the house will become a place of passion and love once more.

The clash between illicit affairs and family loyalties, a decadent and yet somehow innocent, idyllic setting - all provide the elements of a gripping commercial novel, with a more serious sub-text: how do we respond to the frustrations life puts in our way, and how many of us would give into temptation? Natasha Farrant is being compared to Esther Freud and Adele Geras for her highly sympathetic (but not perfect) characters and strong, dramatic writing.

UK Publisher: Transworld, September 2009

DIVING INTO LIGHT
Tesco's book of the month and Waterstones summer promotion

Every summer throughout her childhood, Florence would return to her family home on the west coast of France, where she would be joined by her exotic, hopelessly glamorous cousins and life as she knew it would begin under the benevolent eye of her grandmother Mimi. It was a heady existence of illicit drinking, stolen kisses and the bittersweet pains of first love.

But now Florence is living completely alone with her new baby. Haunted by nightmares, she cannot open the letters from her grandmother accumulating on her mantelpiece. What devastating truth do these letters hold? Why has Florence turned her back on her past? And will she and Mimi ever be able to escape the guilt that is tearing them apart and has shaken their family to its very core?

DIVING INTO LIGHT is steeped in emotion and drama; it’s got the sweep of story and place which one associates with writers like Elizabeth Jane Howard, and the sexiness and humour of Mary Wesley.

UK Publisher: Transworld, July 2008

Foreign sales: Germany, Holland

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NEIL FORSYTH

Neil Forsyth is a freelance journalist who has written for (amongst others) the Scotsman, The Mail on Sunday, Scotland on Sunday, Maxim, Details and Esquire. He has also written two non fiction books OTHER PEOPLE’S MONEY, The rise and fall of Britain’s Boldest Credit Card Fraudster Elliot Castro which has been optioned for feature film and DELETE THIS AT YOUR PERIL a critically acclaimed hilarious collection of responses to spam emails.

LET THEM COME THROUGH

Twentysomething stage medium Nick Santini finds himself implicated in the death of a young girl, employed as one of the backstage assistants on his latest tour. The death threatens to derail all of Nick and his scuttling manager, Tony’s, plans as this tour was intended as a ‘comeback’ from an earlier almost forgotten scandal which torpedoed Nick’s fledgling television career.

Nick finds himself struggling to hold it together mentally and physically as pressure builds from both the sinister and corrupt policeman who is leading the investigation, and a journalist from a local paper, who seems to be delving into events Nick thought were carefully hidden.

In counterpoint to this story, the reader is given glimpses into Nick’s childhood and we are exposed to the twisted figure of his father, a man whose warped attitudes have shaped Nick’s own outlook on life. The sudden reappearance of his father – uninvited and rightly unloved – only adds to Nick’s present day crisis.

Told in a vivid, acerbic first person narrative this is a fascinating exposé of the poisonous, cynical world of professional mediums – the ticks and tricks of the trade, the grubby atmosphere of the hotel rooms in unnamed towns, the backstage bickering – all are captured with Forsyth’s mordant wit.

UK publisher: Serpents Tail/Profile, Summer 2009

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JEAN FULLERTON

Jean joined MBA Agents as a client after she won the 2006 Harry Bowling Prize for her novel NO CURE FOR LOVE. She is married to a Cof E vicar and they live in Stratford in East London. Like Harry, Jean is a true cockney and she has worked as a nurse and as a lecturer on health and nursing. She has published romantic novels with E-publisher Triskelion.

A GLIMPSE OF HAPPINESS

When Josie O’Casey returns to London after twelve years in America, she is overjoyed to discover that her childhood sweetheart Patrick Nolan, who she believed to be dead, is alive and well. But Josie’s happiness is short-lived – Patrick now belongs to another.

Heartbroken, Josie vows to forget about Patrick and settle back into life in the East End. But the East End that Josie knew as a child is much changed. While Josie can remember only too clearly her poverty-stricken upbringing, her family’s social standing has vastly improved since they’ve been away. And there are some who resent that Josie left behind the slums of London to return as a lady. Torn between two worlds, Josie is still drawn back to her childhood haunts – and to Patrick

When the couple are finally offered a glimmer of hope, their chance at happiness is threatened by the all-powerful Ma Tugman and her criminal empire. Now Josie must decide if she is willing to forsake everything for the man she loves…

Praise for A GLIMPSE OF HAPPINESS:

I'm certain that Jean Fullerton's second East End saga will delight her growing legion of fans. Dilly Court.

UK Publisher: Orion, November 2009

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Previously published: SPRING WILL BE OURS, KEEPING SECRETS, THE LAST GUESTS OF THE SEASON, LETTERS FROM PRAGUE which was serialised on Woman’s Hour, THE HOURS OF THE NIGHT which was awarded the Romantic Novelists Association Novel of the Year in 1997, EARTH AND HEAVEN, THIN AIR, shortlisted for RNA Novel of the Year 2003; THE MYSTERIES OF GLASS (longlisted for the Orange Prize 2005).

READING IN BED

Shortlisted for Good Housekeeping 2008 book award; Daily Mail Book of the Month Choice; WH Smith read of the week; included in Waterstoones, Smiths and Borders promotions

Friends since university, with busy working lives now behind them, Dido and Georgia have long been looking forward to books and outings, conversation and carefree days. Alas: life is rarely as one wishes it to be, and both find themselves caught up in wholly unexpected domestic drama. Dido, for the first time, has cause to question her marriage; widowed Georgia is certain her husband will return to her. Meanwhile an eccentric country cousin goes wildly off the rails, children are unhappy in love, and perfect health is all at once in question. Turning to one another should be as natural as breathing but with so much at stake even this old friendship comes under strain. As hatches are battened down, and silence falls, it takes all their loyalty and humour to recover the easy confiding intimacy of the past.

Wry, surprising, moving and uplifting, READING IN BED will delighted anyone who has known the pleasure of turning to a well-loved book, or a true friend.

‘Humorous, wryly-observed, she is never less than assured – especially on the small stuff, those moments to pause and ‘drink in being alive.’’
Daily Mail

Giving great vividness to their inner lives, Gee unerringly and confidently evokes her characters.’
Elizabeth Buchan, The Times

UK publisher: Headline Review July 2007, published in May 2008 in paperback

Previous foreign rights sold: USA, Germany

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CLIO GRAY
Clio won the 2004 Harry Bowling Prize for her first novel, which was subsequently bought in a two-book deal by Headline. Clio has also written award-winning short stories which have been published in magazines and anthologies. She lives in Scotland where she works as a librarian. In July 2006 Clio Gray won the prestigious Scotsman-Orange short story prize. Her latest novel, THE BROTHERHOOD OF FIVE, is the FOURTH in the acclaimed crime series set in nineteenth-century England.

THE BROTHERHOOD OF FIVE

IThe Island of Thanet, 1808. One man is pushed into a kiln of molten metal beneath the looming shadow of the Shot Tower, and another is dug up from the sandy bay beyond. Who they were, and why they died so strangely, is no ordinary mystery, and Missing Persons Finder Whilbert Stroop has a hard time finding answers.

On arrival in this marshy, coastal corner of Kent, on the very edge of England, Stroop tries to piece together the puzzle of these deaths, and the significance of the objects each man died trying to protect. It is a conspiracy that began ten years before on the battlefields of Europe, and one that will claim more lives before it is done.

UK: Headline, August 2009

Praise for Clio Gray:

" just as bloody as The Da Vinci Code... however, much better written" Scotsman

‘Clio Gray is a master of atmosphere and sensuousness. She combines historical realism with the bizarre, whimsy with the macabre. Reading her is like being at a sumptuous feast in a palace, just before it is stormed.’
Alan Bissett

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SHARON GRIFFITHS

Sharon Griffiths comes from Pembrokeshire, west Wales. She worked for many years at the BBC, before becoming a freelance journalist based in Yorkshire. She writes two columns a week for The Northern Echo in Darlington and two for the Eastern Daily Press in Norwich. She also writes features for national newspapers plus some radio and TV work.

THE LOST GUIDE TO LOVE AND LIFE

A novel about all the good things in life: food, football, long lost cousins, and of course, finding Mr Right.

In a nightclub full of the rich and royal, a top model leaps from a window and lopes off, barefoot, down the street. Tilly Flint, starry-eyed among household-name footballers and their hangers-on, is sole witness to her flight. She has to come to the nightclub with her journalist boyfriend, Jake, who is investigating corruption in the Premiership, in particular a lead involving a wealthy, well-connected businessman.

The following week, on a working holiday in the wild landscape of the North Pennines, Tilly and Jake have the last of many arguments and he stomps off, leaving her alone in a remote cottage. Jake is snooping on the top footballers visiting the businessman’s country estate, and Tilly – who writes about food - has set up some stories of her own. A chance encounter with one of the footballers on the moor leads Tilly into the inner sanctum and a taste of their wealthy-beyond-dreams lifestyle. Tempted and repelled at the same time, Tilly is surprised by how easily she seems to fit in that world. But she is preoccupied by a strangely familiar figure in the local pub, and the discovery that she has family in the neighbourhood and in particular a formidable great grandmother whose story has a familiar resonance which is both exciting and disturbing.

Caught in a clash between the old world of solid Victorian morality and the new world of flashy risk-taking, Tilly will learn that past experience has much more value than she ever imagined.

UK Publisher: Avon, September 2009

THE ACCIDENTAL TIME TRAVELLER is her first novel

If 50 is the new 30, then where does that leave today’s 30-year-olds? How would they have coped in a less indulgent age? In 2008, journalists Will and Rose love each other, live together but are still not quite a couple. He thinks she is too independent for commitment. She thinks he is too immature. It would have been very different in the 1950s…

Then Rosie is researching a feature on the 1950s and suddenly finds herself living the story. It’s 1953, and she is working on a newspaper: offices full of men and cigarette smoke and women making coffee and writing recipes. What’s worse is that Will is there too. But in the 1950s he is known as Billy and has been married since he was 16 and has three children. In the different circumstances of the 1950s, Will/Billy is a family man and devoted father; he grows vegetables and even has a shed. He is, in fact, a grown up.

Rose is desperate for Billy to love her in the 1950s the way Will does in 2008. 1950s Billy is intrigued to have a female colleague as hungry for the big stories as he is, and is clearly very taken with Rosie - but he would never betray his wife and family. Ironically now that she really knows Will and is sure he’s the one for her, she can no longer have him. Unless she can get back to 2008…

A wonderfully warm romantic comedy, whose heroine is transported back to the 50s and finds she rather likes the traditional values of the time. One of the debuts most likely to be an instant hit that I’ve seen.’ Bookseller

UK Publisher: Avon Books, July 2008

Foreign sales: Spain, Holland, Germany, Romania

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AMBREEN HAMEED

Ambreen Hameed has been a producer/director in British television for fifteen years. Trained as a journalist, Ambreen’s career in television began at the BBC on the Asian programme, “Network East”. She has produced many documentaries mostly on social issues and many concerned with matters of race. She was series producer of the award-winning Channel 4 series “Devil’s Advocate” and two of her “London Programmes” have been nominated for RTS awards. Her recent projects include “Second Chance” a peak-time series on school exclusion for Channel 4, and “Dispatches”.

Ambreen’s investigative career and passionately enquiring mind have compelled her to turn her hand to fiction. Her first book is a crossover title is about a schoolgirl who just doesn’t fit in. SHRINKING FRANCESCA TIDDLEY is a witty and intelligent plea against institutionalisation and an amazing worm hole ride into the worlds of Einstein and Zeno. It is undergoing a final edit and will be ready at the end of the year. Ambreen is also writing an adult book with her sister about love, betrayal and mass terrorism called UNDYING

SGB

THE MENDINI CANTICLE

3rd and concluding part of Dr Sigmundus Trilogy

For years Dr Sigmundus has ruled Gehenna with an iron grip. Now he is dead, and the country has a new leader – Dante Cazabon.

But why has Dante joined forces with his enemy? Does he really want to destroy the Puca and kill his old friend, Bea? And what is the purpose of the bridge he is building within the Odyllic realm?

As Dante is crowned Sigmundus the Second, a new and terrible phase in the history of Gehenna is about to begin, a phase in which the true meaning of the Mendini Canticle will become horribly clear.

In THE MENDINI CANTICLE, Brian Keaney concludes the thrilling trilogy that began with THE HOLLOW PEOPLE.

UK Publisher: Orchard Books, October 2008

Foreign sales: Lithuania, France, Norway, Greece, Portugal, USA

NATHANIEL WOLFE AND THE BODYSNATCHERS

The dead cannot rest in peace. Bodysnatchers are plundering the graveyard and stirring up more than they bargained for. It's a job for a ghost hunter! But first Nathaniel Wolfe must take a terrifying journey to the Other Side and put right a terrible wrong...

NATHANIEL WOLFE AND THE BODYSNATCHERS is the second novel featuring the young detective of the supernatural. The first THE HAUNTING OF NATHANIEL WOLFE was published in 2008.

UK publisher: Orchard, June 2009

Previously published:
DON’T HANG ABOUT, SOME PEOPLE NEVER LEARN, NO NEED FOR HEROES, IF THIS IS THE REAL WORLD, BOYS DON’T WRITE LOVE STORIES, FAMILY SECRETS, THE PRIVATE LIFE OF GEORGIA BROWN, BITTER FRUIT, BALLOON HOUSE, FALLING FOR JOSHUA, JACOB'S LADDER, HOLLOW PEOPLE, THE HAUNTING OF NATHANIEL WOLFE

LL

MARK LALBEHARRY

Mark Lalbeharry was joint winner of the Harry Bowling Prize in 2002. He lives and works in London and this is his first novel.

THE SIMIAN CURVE
www.thesimiancurve.com

On a freezing November afternoon, a headless corpse is found in the garage belonging to Thomas Tranmore, a maverick scientist who has worked for the Ministry of Defence. His house has been emptied of all furniture and possessions, his bank account is also empty. He seems to have no family, few friends and colleagues are reticent in talking about him.

DCI Diane Cresson and her team are assigned to the case. They soon discover that some very high-up people seem to know quite a lot about what Tranmore has been up to recently, and don’t necessarily want to share that information. Then another body is found in a nearby lake...

The Symian Curve marks the arrival of a powerful new thriller writer. Already showing the sure touch of a master craftsman, Mark Lalbeharry has created an utterly absorbing and chilling tale of murder and deception

UK Publisher: Robert Hale, December 2006

LL

ADAM LEBOR
Adam LeBor was born in London and studied at Leeds University and also at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. He worked for several national British newspapers before becoming a foreign correspondent in 1991. Currently Central Europe Correspondent for The Times he also contributes to Literary Review, the Jerusalem Report and The Economist.

THE BUDAPEST PROTOCOL
Inspired by declassified US Intelligence Reports - a sinister conspiracy thriller based on 1944 US intelligence documents which reveal how Nazi leaders planned a Fourth Reich - not a military empire, but an economic one.

Nazi - occupied Budapest, winter 1944. The Russians are smashing through the German lines. Miklos Farkas breaks out of the Jewish ghetto to find food - at the Nazis’ headquarters. There he is handed a stolen copy of THE BUDAPEST PROTOCOL, detailing the Nazis post-war plans. Miklos knows it must stay hidden for ever if he is to stay alive.

The book jumps to present day Budapest. As the European Union launches the election campaign for the first President of Europe, Miklos Farkas is brutally murdered. His journalist grandson Alex buries his grief to track down the killers. He soon unravels a chilling conspiracy rooted in the dying days of the Third Reich, one that will ensure Nazi economic domination of Europe - and a plan for a new Gypsy Holocaust. The hunt is on for THE BUDAPEST PROTOCOL.

UK Publisher: Reportage Press, May 2009

Rights sold: Romania, Hungary

LL

THE LOST IVORY
This is the first in a fantasy trilogy for children by a debut novelist. It’s a wonderful, heartfelt story about a land betrayed by its refusal to acknowledge its own history.

Gaia and her brother Tal are on the mountainside looking after the family goats when there’s an unseasonal attack by dragons. Then their feudal lord makes an unexpected visit to bleed them dry of what few resources they have. When he doesn’t find enough to cover his gambling debts, he takes most of the village as slaves: their best friend, and even their mother.

In desperation, Gaia and Tal leave the mountainside – the first of the villagers to do so in living memory. What they find is a land in distress. When they arrive in the capital city, and hope to rescue their mother, Gaia gets arrested for stealing food and Tal denies her to save his own life.

After miserable and dangerous adventures separately, they find each other again – and discover the real history of their land.

Rights sold: Germany: Oetinger; France: Mango

MD

Ava McCarthy

Aiveen is a Dublin-based computer expert who has studied medical physics and worked at the London Stock Exchange. THE INSIDER is her first novel, a tense, action-packed thriller set in Dublin and the Bahamas.

THE INSIDER

Four weeks in Heatseekers bestselling chart; Sainsburys Book Club Book of the Month

When €12m shows up in Harry’s bank account and someone body-slams her under a train, she figures the two events must be connected. When the connection turns out to be her own father, her life takes a chilling turn.

Based in Dublin, Harry Martinez is a computer hacker turned security professional who gets paid to break the law. Her father, Sal Martinez, charmer, investment banker and high stakes poker player, was once Harry’s childhood hero. But he’s driven her away with a lifetime of broken promises and now he’s in prison. He belongs to an insider trading ring, whose leader is a cold-blooded killer called THE PROPHET. The Prophet reckons the €12m is his, and he’ll stop at nothing to get it back. Then one of the insider traders ends up dead and it looks like Harry’s next.

The Prophet gives Harry 48 hours to hand over the €12m, but suddenly the money disappears. Can Harry swallow her pride and go to her father for help, or can she find the money herself in the most daring and dangerous computer scam she has yet attempted?

Praise for THE INSIDER:
‘…an edge-of-your-seat thriller….. Harry Martinez is one of the most likeable heroines I’ve read in a long time! Irish Independent

‘What a delight…this is a book with an impressive grasp of computers and Texas Hold ‘Em, not to mention a heroine who can truly root for.’ Daily Mail

‘This is a storming debut thriller with a central character who is a clear-eyed, non-sentimental soul sister of Val McDermid’s Kate Brannigan or Sara Paretsky’s VI Warshawski. The Irish Times

UK Publisher: HarperCollins, May 2009

Foreign sales: Germany, France, Italy, Spain, Poland, Holland, Czech Republic, Norway, Taiwan, China, Bulgaria, Russia

LL

JAN MINSHULL
Jan lives in the Lake District. This is her first novel.

www.janminshull.co.uk

COAST TO COAST
With her husband nearing retirement and her children grown up and left home, Linda is facing a crossroads in her life. Does she follow her husband around his favourite golf courses, making awkward conversation with the other wives? Does she turn her part-time job into a small business? In a rash moment, she decides to do the famous Coast to Coast walk across the North of England: from the Yorkshire moors to the mountains and lakes of Cumbria: the perfect opportunity to think about everything, and to prove to her doubting family that she can. Tramping through the stunning scenery of the Yorkshire Moors and the Lake District, in rain and shine, Linda enjoys the company of other walkers, especially Nick and his dog. The walk is interspersed with flashbacks to Linda’s life, as a child, as a daughter, as a wife and mother. We learn the true reason that Linda’s marriage feels like a trap are not surprised that Nick is clearly attracted to her.

An entirely satisfying read: the reader feels they have walked with Linda, but without the aching feet and limbs, and as she prepares to return home we are on tenterhooks as to which way her affections will turn...

UK: Transita, May 2006

'A likeable heroine who deals with marital crisis in a novel way. I strongly recommend you make this journey of discovery with her.’
Benita Brown, novelist

LL

FAMILY MATTERS

When Diane Jenner’s husband Gareth is hurt in a helicopter crash, his secrets begin to seep out. The pilot, also very badly hurt, was Gareth’s half-sister Valerie. At her hospital bedside, Diane is amazed to meet Valerie and Gareth’s father, Harold. As far as Diane knows, Gareth never knew his father, let alone sister, and their life together has been constrained by shortage of money and his absences for work. But Harold and Valerie are rich, and Gareth has been spending a lot of time with them. Why has he kept this life, and his sudden new wealth, secret? What else is he hiding from Diane?

A contemporary story of betrayal and guilt and how money can make or break family ties.

UK publisher: Robert Hale, 2008

Praise for UPHILL ALL THE WAY:
‘A strongly written story that many women will relate to.’ Katie Fforde

LL

DANCING WITH FELIX (WORKING TITLE)

Felix Kendall has done something very bad. Something that will shock people and make headline news. Bad enough for the police to detain his wife, on her way back from a trip to Canada, for questioning. And to go to his children’s schools and friends’ houses and interview them all too.

Kate returns to England and a home under siege from noisy paparazzi, her children frightened and confused. Her husband has disappeared – has he killed himself, run away? No one knows. Their bank accounts frozen, she is forced to turn to her father, a retired headmaster, for help. Felix was a model pupil at Kate’s father’s school and often visited their house. Even as a teenager Felix was sure of what he wanted from life: to make money and have a perfect family life. His own childhood had been unusual: after his parents were killed in a fire, he was brought up by elderly, eccentric aunts. But he had achieved both of his goals: he was a partner in a successful accountancy firm and he was a careful father and a sensitive husband. His family adored him.

Kate’s life is shattered by Felix’s betrayal. Who could she trust, if not him? How was she going to survive, without money? They would have to move house, the children would have to leave their schools, she would have to change…

UK Publisher: Sceptre, February 2010

THE LANGUAGE OF OTHERS

The world is a puzzling, sometimes frightening place for Jessica Fontaine. As a child she only finds contentment in playing the piano and wandering alone in the empty spaces of Audlands Hall, the dilapidated country house where she grows up.

Twenty-five years later, divorced, with her son still living at home, Jessica is still preoccupied by the desire to create space around her. Then her volatile ex-husband reappears, the first of several surprises that both transform Jessica’s present and give her a startling new perspective on the past.

The Language of Others tells the absorbing story of a woman who spends much of her life feeling that she is out of step with the real world, until she discovers why. Related with humour and compassion, it offers a fresh,illuminating insight into what it means to be 'normal'.

UK: Sceptre, March 2008

Foreign rights sold: France(Fayard), Holland (Ambo Anthos), Lithuania, Taiwan

UK: Sceptre, January 2006

Rights sold in: USA, Canada, Germany, Holland, Greece, France, Spain, Taiwan

Praise for ASTONISHING SPLASHES OF COLOUR
‘Absorbing and sure-footed... Extremely well written and compulsively readable.’ Sunday Times

‘An extremely good first novel about loss, particularly lost children’ Guardian

‘Deceptively simple, subtly observed, with a plot that drags you forward like a strong current.’ Daily Mail

‘ A wonderful piece of writing - it is astonishing that she has never been published before’ John Carey, Chair of the Man Booker Prize

LL

A CHRISTMAS PROMISE

Anne’s Christmas novellas have proved to be a hit with everyone round the world: the ideal gift for someone you love, or a treat for yourself.

As is the custom with these novellas, Anne features one of the well-known and well-loved characters from either her series about Thomas and Charlotte Pitt, or about Thomas and Hester Monk. This 7th one features Charlotte Pitt's maid Gracie, and describes how they came to meet. Gracie finds a little girl crying in the street, because her father has died and his donkey is missing. Together they piece together how her father was murdered – but will they find Charlie the donkey?

UK: Headline, November 2009

LISSON GROVE (26th in the Pitt series)
UK: Headline, 2011
Translation rights: MBA

Pitt and his immediate junior, Gower, are witnesses to the violent murder of a known socialist with strong connections to revolutionaries all over Europe. The man is garotted almost in front of them, and in hot blood they chase the murderer, whom they know is a man named Wrexham. First he takes the train to Southampton, goes to the docks and boards the ferry for St. Malo.

They have the opportunity to arrest him on the ferry, but Gower points out that he has strong connections in Europe also, especially France, and they need to know what he plans. From his previous assignments he has learned that Wrexham is a highly dangerous man. If they can follow him, they could learn more.

Meanwhile, Pitt’s boss Narraway has a shock when he is sacked from his job. Without Pitt to turn to, he goes to Charlotte – with whom he’s secretly in love. She undertakes to help him clear his name and get his job back. But she doesn’t realise that Pitt’s been decoyed away from where the danger is – and she’s right in the firing line.

The previous book in this series, BUCKINGHAM PALACE GARDENS, rose to No. 12 on New York Times bestseller list April 2008, and is nominated for Romantic Times Best Novel 2008 and for an Agatha Award for Best Novel 2009

Praise for LONG SPOON LANE...

“In ‘Long Spoon Lane’ Perry… presents us with moral and political puzzles that are all too close to our own.”

Los Angeles Times

“Deeply impressive.” The Good Book Guide

The ‘Monk’ series
An English detective series set in the mid-1800's, and featuring the detective William Monk and ex-nurse Hester Latterly.

EXECUTION DOCK (16th in the Monk series)

UK: Headline, April 2009 US: Random House

In the previous book in this series, Dark Assassin, Monk broke up a particularly nasty paedophile club, based in a boat permanently moored in the Thames. Having thought the case concluded, he’s horrified to discover that the roots of this club are even deeper – and lead to the father of Margaret Rathbone, who’s married to his close friend, the lawyer Oliver Rathbone. Margaret forces Oliver to defend her father in court, not believing he would be capable of being involved in paedophile activity. It’s a severe test of loyalty for them all.

First rate’ New York Times (of Face of a Stranger)

THE SHEEN ON THE SILK

nne Perry, undisputed ruler of the Victorian mystery novel, now broadens her canvas. THE SHEEN ON THE SILK will be a rich and fascinating stand-alone novel. Three years in the making, this will be Anne’s most ambitious book to date.

The gorgeous, cosmopolitan and enlightened city of Byzantium has never recovered from its sack by the Venetians, and now, in 1272, the Emperor must tread a difficult line between resolving religious schism and civil war.

This is the city into which Anna arrives. A handsome woman with an unhappy past, she has just learned that her brother has been imprisoned for murder. Unable to believe that he’s guilty, she will stay in Byzantium until she can find out the truth and secure his release.

As the future of Byzantium grows ever darker, Anna struggles to navigate the complex truths of her brother’s guilt or innocence, the intrigues of the powerful, long-simmering revenge plots… and the even more perilous currents of her heart and her spirit. Only in Byzantium’s darkest hour does she discover the truths that will lead to salvation for Byzantium and the soaring path to the forgiveness and love of God.

THE SHEEN ON THE SILK is an epic historical novel with a heart-stopping love story at its core, and a deep spiritual quest.

UK Publisher: Headline, April 2010

World War 1 Series
WE SHALL NOT SLEEP The Final book in the First World War series
TThe final book in the First World War series

October 1918. The war is in its closing stages. Joseph and Matthew are desperate to solve the conspiracy, because they know their arch-enemy will find a way to be involved in the war settlement – to Britain’s disadvantage.

Trying to save his skin, the Peacemaker’s cousin turns himself in, agreeing to reveal the identity of the mastermind. However, just as he arrives at Joseph’s field hospital, hidden among other German defectors, one of the nurses is brutally raped. Of course, everyone wants to believe it’s one of the German prisoners, and no one can leave the hospital until the truth is found. Joseph finally obtains the last pieces of information he needs about the master plot. The man is the German counterpart to the British leader of the conspiracy. Joseph, Judith, and Mason bundle him into an ambulance and drive for all their worth through France, trying to get him to London to alert the Prime Minister to the plot. After a hair-raising journey, they burst into Lloyd George’s office and expose the Peacemaker at last. Then silence falls: the guns have stopped. It’s the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month.

Book 1: NO GRAVES AS YET (Sept 2003)
Book 2: SHOULDER THE SKY (Sept 04)
Book 3: ANGELS IN THE GLOOM (Sept 05)
Book 4: AT SOME DISPUTED BARRICADE (Sept 06)
Book 5: THEY SHALL NOT SLEEP (Sept 07)

UK: Headline US: Random House

Praise for NO GRAVES AS YET
‘This absorbing mystery/spy thriller, set in tranquil Cambridge just before the onset of the Great War, marks a powerful start to bestseller Perry’s much anticipated new series.’ Starred review, Publishers Weekly

Previous foreign sales for Anne Perry in: US, Italy, Germany, Japan, Korea, Greece, France, Spain, Netherlands and Portugal,

MD

WHEN SWALLOWS COME AGAIN
IThe new wartime saga from the hugely popular Victor Pemberton is 'History with a heart on its sleeve', (Northern Echo) Mary Trimble doesn't have a penny to her name, and life has been hard since her parents were killed in an air raid two years ago. It's up to her to look after her two young sisters, little brother and elderly granddad. Mary works as an usherette at the Marlborough cinema in the Holloway Road, but her dream is to escape the horrors of London and take her family on a long bus trip to some faraway place on the famous Blue Coach from Victoria Coach Station to Devon. But little does she know her dream will come at a tragic price.....

UK Publisher: Headline, December 2008

DT

STEF PENNEY

THE TENDERNESS OF WOLVES

2006 COSTA BOOK OF THE YEAR

As winder tightens its grip on the isolated settlement of Dove River, a woman steels herself for the journey of a lifetime. A man has been brutally murdered and her seventeen-year-old son has disappeared. The violence has re-opened old wounds and inflamed deep-running tensions in the frontier township – some want to solve the crime; others seek only to exploit it.

To clear her son’s name, she has no choice but to follow the tracks leaving the dead man’s cabin and head north into the forest and the desolate landscape that lies beyond it…

‘A remarkable literary debut…brilliantly assured, subtly written.’ Scotsman

‘A fascinating, suspense-filled adventure.’ Sunday Telegraph

‘A suspenseful epic, offering a leitmotif of constant unease… impressive.’ Guardian

UK Publisher: Quercus, 2006

Rights sold: USA: Simon Schuster; Canada: Penguin; France: Belfond ; Italy: Einaudi; Germany: Goldmann; Holland: Prometheus; Spain: Salamandra, Spain (Catalan); Portugal: Difel ; Sweden, Norway, Denmark & Finland: Bazar; Czech: BB Art; Hebrew: Book In Attic; Japan: Hayawaka; Greece: Papyros; Estonia: Pegasus; Chinese Complex: Rye Field; Poland: Sonia Draga; Slovenia: Mladinska Knijiga; Romania: Polirom, Croatia: Algoritum; Russia: Inostranka; Serbia: Plato Publishing

DT

A BIT OF HERO

Trumpeter and ace footballer Tom has lost all his interest in playing now that he’s lost his dad. There’s a big bully at school, Mum is finding new male friends, but Tom just wants his fireman dad back. Will he find the same courage his father showed, stand up to the bully and look for the best in life?

UK Publisher: Anderson Press, March 2009

DT

Bea Klednik lives in Elbow, where it rains all summer. Most people leave to go somewhere sunny, but there are always a few misfit kids left behind who haven’t got money or parents. Because the friends they normally spend time with have gone, the school insists that they get together during the summer.

Bea is desperate to leave Elbow, so she decides to enter a photography competition for a trip to Florida. But when Sam shows her a dead body he’s just found in a derelict house, something strange happens to her camera.

The mystery deepens. Who killed the owner of the factory that makes Bea’s favourite chilli relish? Why is the last train to Elbow still stuck out of town, rusting on its tracks? What’s the mystery of the ring they’ve found, in the shape of a castle, and why are they being chased for it? The answers are rooted in the history of this Twin Peaks-ish town.

UK publisher: Chicken House, May 2009

US publisher: Scholastic, 2010

SGB & MD

THE GOOD PLAIN COOK
Selected for the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award

It’s summer 1936, and the world is on the cusp of change, but there’s little sign of this in rural Sussex. So when local girl Kitty Allen answers an advert looking for ‘a good plain cook’, she has no idea what she’s in for. For starters, her employer is an American called Ellen Steinberg who believes in calling the staff by their first names and sunbathing in the nude. Then there’s Ellen’s eleven-year-old daughter, Geenie, a bright, unhappy little thing, and Mrs Steinberg’s gentleman friend, Mr Crane, who’s said to be a poet — even though he doesn’t have a beard and doesn’t seem to write much poetry either. Rich bohemians imagining themselves as communists, Steinberg and Crane see themselves as champions of ‘the people’ — not that they know the first thing about how the people actually live.

Kitty is in no place to criticise — after all she claimed to be a good plain cook, despite hardly knowing how to boil an egg. Utterly out of her depth, she is relieved to have the gardener, Arthur, to talk to. Otherwise she’d never last a summer in this madhouse. Ellen Steinberg wants life to run as smoothly as the love story she imagines her lover George Crane to be writing. But as Kitty arrives, the dream is on the edge of falling apart.

Gorgeously written, full of teasing observations about love, class and cookery.’ THE TIMES

Quote for THE POOLS - ‘A complex anatomy of a murder, The Pools brilliantly evokes the sickening recognition of a wasteful death. Bethan Roberts is a fearless writer whose first novel raises questions about fate and responsibility that remain with the reader long after the last page has been turned. A compelling debut’ Louise Welsh

Rights sold: France: Christian Bourgois, Germany: Kunstmann

UK Publisher: Serpents Tail, July 2008

THE POOLS
Set in an Oxfordshire village, THE POOLS tells the story of the events leading up to the murder of a teenage boy. The novel is told through two voices; that of the boy’s father, the unfailingly sensible but sensitive Howard Hall and that of the boy’s friend, the deceptively confident but confused young girl Joanna Denton.

The story is broad in scope - covering twenty years of family history, but extremely intimate in its focus. Bethan displays remarkable maturity in her presentation of these lives brimming with domestic and sexual anguish.

UK Publisher: Serpents Tail, 2007

DR

SCARPER JACK AND THE BLOOD STAINED ROOM

Sweep’s boy Jack is working inside a chimney when he overhears a murder being planned. He knows when and where it’s going to happen but will anyone believe him if he tries to tell? Leaping and scrambling across the roof tops, he finds the appointed place. But before he can see or hear any more, an unseen assailant knocks him unconscious. The bloody murder is committed inside a locked building. Then Jack gets a further shock: his own no-good father is involved.

With the help of two unexpected friends – posh boy Rupert and sewer rat April – Jack sets out to track down the murderer and solve what the press are calling the “impossible crime.” Very soon, though, he discovers that it’s dangerous to know too much.

This Victorian adventure story for 8 to 12 year olds is the first in an intended series about Jack and his gang. In the second they will save an innocent man from being hanged for murder. Jack will use his amazing agility to escape from Newgate jail and April will lead the rescued man to safety through the sewers. But only after they have snatched him from under the noses of the hangman and the expectant crowd.

UK Publisher: Puffin, March 2008

SMUGGLERS
A novel for children
1822. Pin, a street urchin and stowaway is shipwrecked on the English coast.

He is rescued by Rueben, who lives with his family on the dangerous rocky shore, making a meagre living from fishing and scavenging wrecks. Reuben’s neighbours are shocked: to save someone from drowning is to cheat the sea. Bad luck will surely follow.

It does, in the form of the Coastguards, a newly established paramilitary force tasked to stamp out smuggling. Reuben’s family have until now managed without joining the smugglers but an unnecessarily brutal Coastguard damages their nets, leaving them no alternative.

Reuben and Pin become involved in a smuggling run which goes disastrously wrong. Reuben’s brother Daniel is accused of murdering a Coastguard and Reuben of betraying the ‘traders,’ who take the law into their own hands. They leave Reuben for dead. Pin rescues him but now it is a race against time to save Daniel.

UK Publisher: Puffin February 2007
Previous rights sold Italy, France, USA

DT

SIMON SCARROW
Until recently, Simon Scarrow taught at a leading Sixth Form College. He has in the past run a Roman History programme taking parties of students to a number of ruins and museums across Britain. Having enjoyed the novels of Forester, Cornwell and O'Brian, and fired by the knowledge gleaned from his exploration of Roman sites, he decided to write what he wanted to read - a military page-turner set during the Roman invasion of Britain in 43AD. He lives in Norwich with his wife and two young sons and now writes full time.

CENTURION

FIRE AND SWORD
The third of a four-part fictionalised biography of Napoleon and Wellington, this was four weeks on the top 10 Sunday Times bestseller list.
By 1804, Napoleon has established himself as Emperor, and has his sights set on conquering all of Europe. He has established members of his family on the royal thrones of neighbouring countries, but isn’t content to give the people of France the period of peace and prosperity that they now demand. The time has come for Arthur Wellesly, Duke of Wellington to stand against Napoleon in the confrontation that lies ahead.

A wonderful, multi-layered introduction to an epic series.

UK: Headline – February 2009

Already published: UNDER THE EAGLE, THE EAGLE’S CONQUEST, WHEN THE EAGLE HUNTS, THE EAGLE AND THE WOLVES, THE EAGLE’S PREY, YOUNG BLOODS, EAGLE'S PROPHECY.

Praise for Simon Scarrow…
“A great read, full of excitement … I really don’t need this kind of competition.”
Bernard Cornwell

“An engrossing storyline full of teeth-clenching battles, political machinations, treachery, honour, love and death.”
Elizabeth Chadwick

Foreign Rights Sold: United States, Germany, Spain, Portugal, Turkey, Finland, Czech Republic…

www.scarrow.co.uk
MD

MEL STEIN
Mel Stein is a prominent sports lawyer and broadcaster having written many non-fiction books, including a How to guide on becoming a sports agent and the official biographies of clients Paul Gascoigne and Chris Waddle.

FOOTBALL BABYLON

At last...the book that does for the beautiful game what Hotel Babylon did for the hospitality industry!

In over 30 years of operating within the football game, Mel Stein has seen it all. In FOOTBALL BABYLON, his novel, he takes an unflinching look at the typical ups and downs of a newly arrived Premiership club, as it slides inexorably back to the championship the fictional Thamesmead City. Chairmen, managers, players, agents, officials, journalists, television pundits, marketing and public relations even the medical staff and the groundsmen all their deepest secrets are seen through the jaundiced eye of the Club Secretary, our narrator. Authentic glimpses are given into the macho locker-room world of the players, and their legal troubles off the pitch: drink-driving, rape allegations, failed drug tests even a shooting incident that results in serious injury. In FOOTBALL BABYLON, every event described has, at some time, taken place within an English football club. Only the names have been changed...to protect the guilty

UK Publisher: Pennant Books

HAVE LOVE, WILL TRAVEL
Jane Darling works in the tourist office in Edinburgh, helping the lost, the confused and the plain stupid. But she’s the one who needs a map. Her life is going nowhere, she hates Edinburgh, her workmates are a bunch of lunatics, and if anyone asks ‘How long is the Royal Mile?’ one more time, she’ll scream. Then, one day, she finds a diary on a train, containing a photo of a handsome man and the innermost thoughts of someone called Richard Miles. Jane, starved of entertainment and romance, is intrigued, and becomes convinced that he is her ideal man. As she sets off to find him, using the flimsy evidence in the diary, Jane finally gets to embark on an exciting adventure of her own. The question is, will Prince Charming be at the end of the line, or is she heading in the completely wrong direction?

UK Publisher: Black Swan, August 2005

Foreign rights sold: Italy

Praise for HAVE LOVE WILL TRAVEL

“Punchy, droll and fab” – Cosmopolitan

“One to relish” – Independent on Sunday


SS

JOHN TAGHOLM

John Tagholm lives in London and has had a successful career as a television producer, editor and director. Unidentifiable Remains is his first novel.

NO IDENTIFIABLE REMAINS

Oliver Dreyfuss seems to have it all: he is a young, handsome and celebrated London restaurateur at the peak of his career and just weeks away from opening his flagship Parisian restaurant La Mission, with the help of his glamorous and wealthy financier wife Sonya.

On Eurostar travelling to a site visit to meet with gamine project manager Karyn Baird, Oliver makes the momentous decision to visit the buffet, just minutes before a lorry carrying aircraft fuel plunges off a bridge, engulfing the central four carriages in a ball of flames. Crawling from the debris and in a state of shock, Oliver walks away from the wreckage towards a nearby village, where he checks into a hotel and holes up, watching the disaster’s aftermath unfold and realizing that going back to his life is not an option…

Unidentifiable Remains is a riveting thriller with a devastating drama at its core, around which is woven a tale of infidelity, bitterness, jealousy and revenge.

UK Publisher: Quartet Books Ltd, September 2008

DRAWING TOGETHER
Nobody wants to play with Lucy on her first day in school. So her teacher gives her some chalks and Lucy begins to draw animals on the playground. She doesn't notice Zack and Ibrahim sitting at opposite ends of a nearby bench, watching her. As the three stories progress, Lucy, Zack and Ibrahim overcome the awkwardness of being alone at a new school, and become the best of friends, drawing together.


DR and SGB

ESTHER VILAR

Esther Vilar was born in Buenos Aires, Argentina, where her parents had emigrated from pre-war Germany. She has written non-fiction books on religion, intelligence and economics, as well as three novels. Most of her work has been translated into English and many other languages. Esther writes extensively for the theatre where her plays’ have been performed worldwide.

Film rights in SEVEN FIRES OF MADEMOISELLE have been optioned by Kudos

THE SEVEN FIRES OF MADEMOISELLE

Set in sixties America, this is the story of Carlotta, a tomboyish young girl, the only child of diplomatic parents who spend their lives at parties. She spends her time instead with her stunning French au pair Mademoiselle who longs to find love but is following her own set of rules to discover the real man of her dreams. Imagine Carlotta's surprise when this turns out to be not the stream of wealthy and handsome admirers who are always in hot pursuit but Nick Kowalski, the short fat ugly Chief of the Fire Brigade. There's only one problem, he's just not interested. There's only one answer, Carlotta and Mademoiselle must get his attention by lighting harmless fires all over the city to ignite the flames of passion.....

A warm, funny fairy tale romance which turns our expectations of love delightfully upside down.

UK Publisher: Vintage, August 2009

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REKHA WAHEED

Born and raised in West London and of Bengali origin, Rekha Waheed graduated from SOAS, University of London, with a BSc. and Masters in Economics. She worked in the corporate world as a consultant analyst whilst writing her first novel, The A-Z Guide to Arranged Marriage, which was published in 2003. Rekha Waheed is a regular on BBC Asian Network, women’s programs and literary events, often debating social issues affecting British Asians in the west. In 2006, Rekha was listed in Asian Woman as ‘a face to watch’, and she is described in the current British Bengalis Who’s Who as ‘one of the most talented British Asian writers’.

THE LINGERIE STORY

Brit-Asian culture is a contemporary and urban phenomenon that continues to grow. Yet, there are few novels that represent the dynamic ambitions of sophisticated second generation Brit Bengalis. A book like LINGERIE STORY changes that. This is a story about a young woman, Yasmin Yusuf, whose dream of being a success in the business world is challenged by the conflicting worlds of ruthless finance and conservative family beliefs – and sassy lingerie. So, we embark on a feisty story that ultimately tests whether bigger dreams are worth fighting for.

The style of the ‘Lingerie Story’ will appeal to young women daring to believe in their dreams around the world. It will also appeal to Brit-Asians, sub-continent Asians and urbanites as the story is based in London, Dhaka, Bangladesh and Delhi, India.

Praise for The A-Z Guide to Arranged Marriage:

‘Waheed writes with great flair and style using witty alliteration and expressions which many of today's young generation will be able to relate to. Waheed makes a good contribution to contemporary British Asian literature. ‘It’s a SLAAG’s life’

The Asian News

UK Publisher: Little Black Dress, September 2009

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GEE WILLIAMS

Her collection of short stories BLOOD ETC was shortlisted for the Welsh Book of the Year 2009
Nominee for James Tait Black Memorial Prize for Fiction
First time novelist Gee Williams has been nominated for Britain's oldest literary award, the James Tait Black Memorial Prize for fiction. Her literary mystery Salvage is one of only five on the shortlist for the prestigious prize, which is £10,000, and awarded during the Edinburgh Festival week late this August. Born in Wales, Gee Williams has written poetry and short stories and previously worked for the BBC.

SALVAGE

Sometimes the stories we tell ourselves are the ones we most want to hear.

On the brink of scandal, five characters bound by marriage, friendship and lust attempt to rescue what is most important to them. Through their interwoven narratives, Gee Williams deftly explores the dangers of concocting personal fictions. This dark, compelling mystery begins on a desolate stretch of the Welsh coast, when Elly Kent discovers a ring – with a finger still attached.

Written in the brilliantly vivid, vernacular prose of everyday life, Salvage is a taut, engrossing study of betrayal, self-justification and the consequences of rewriting the past.

Shortstory collection BLOOD etc. (Parthian) longlisted for Wales Book of the Year.

&#A controlled and gifted stylist, Williams is inventive and inspiring in her craft.

Prof Colin Nicholson, James Tait Black Prize judge

Shortlisted for James Tait Black Memorial Prize for Fiction, 2007, Pure Gold winner, north Wales Libraries Estyn Allan, and longlisted for the Waverton Good Read Award“

‘Williams’ writing is offbeat, subtle, haunting, fresh. Once I was introduced to these characters I couldn’t get them out of my head.’ Kate Long, best-selling author of The Badmother’s Handbook

“Salvage is the least predictable novel I’ve read in a long time; subtle, sad, unique and beautifully written.” Sally Quilford, The New Writer.

UK Publisher: Granta, August 2009

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TRUST ME, I’M A VET

The start of a great new series of romantic contemporary novels, featuring the life of a country vet (and patients).

Maz Harwood is a Londoner through and through, but she’s an experienced vet and loves her patients. So when she agrees to take over a friend’s practice for a few months in the small market town of Talyton in rural Devon, she thinks it will be a doddle. Two months later and one of her patients is dying of peritonitis, her receptionist has walked out and the practice is losing money and clients. She has also had to deal with the hostility of another local vet, a furious old timer who has not taken kindly to the arrival of a rival practice. Matters are complicated by the overwhelming attraction she feels for the other vet’s son…

TRUST ME I’M A VET has great characters, lots of emotion and drama, human and animal. Think Animal Hospital meets Katie Fforde!

This is the first in a series featuring The Other House Veterinary.

UK Publisher: Random House, April 2010

THE BOY NEXT DOOR
Terri Mills is going home to London. With only a battered mini and a bankruptcy order to show for her life in Devon, she’s not feeling particularly proud of herself. At least her nine-year-old daughter Sasha sees their trip as an adventure.

Growing up, Terri had two passions: flowers, and the boy next door. What’s more, he was all hers – until her parents upped and moved away and she never heard from him again. Now she is back and happy to be working as a florist again. Until she discovers that her new boss is none other than the boy next door, now all grown up and come home himself.

Cathy Woodman’s new novel is a heartwarming and poignant story of how love can blossom when you least expect it…

Praise for Cathy Woodman's previous novels:

'Funny, truthful and original. I loved this book' Jill Mansell

'A cast of diverse characters that grows on you. For a vet, Woodman knows a lot about human nature' Nottingham Evening Post

'A refreshing contemporary romp. It's very astute' Bookseller

UK: Headline March 2007

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