Amazon Throws Down for Middle-Grade Series
In a high six-figure acquisition, Margery Cuyler and Tim Ditlow at Amazon Publishing Children's Publishing took U.S. rights, at auction, to a new middle-grade trilogy called the Blood Guard. Ted Malawer and Michael Stearns at the Inkhouse brokered the deal for the author, who’s writing under the pseudonym Carter Roy; Stearns described Roy as a memoirist and “award-winning short story writer.” The series, which also just sold for six figures in the U.K. to Scholastic (in a deal handled by Curtis Brown’s Stephanie Thwaites), is about a 13-year-old-boy who, Stearns said, gets “swept up in an ancient order of protesters who put their lives on the line to safeguard 36 secret saintly people.” The agents, who called Blood Guard a “swashbuckling sword-swinging adventure,” compared it to Rick Riordan’s Percy Jackson series and the novels of Alexander Dumas. Film rights are being handled by Sally Wilcox at CAA, and Amazon is planning book one for fall 2013 release.
Abrams Re-Ups Myracle
Susan Van Metre at Abrams’s Amulet Books signed world English rights to a fourth book in Lauren Myracle’s bestselling young adult series, ttyl. Agent Barry Goldblatt represented Myracle in the deal, and the book, yolo, is set for fall 2014. Abrams said that, to date, there are two million copies in print of the books in the series (which is formally known as the Internet Girls). In yolo, the three protagonists—Maddie, Angela, and Zoe—head to college where, the publisher said, “the IMs, texts, and e-mails fly as the three forever friends tackle their first year so far apart.”
‘Eat to Live’ M.D. Goes to HarperCollins
Dr. Joel Fuhrman, author of the bestselling diet book Eat to Live, has inked a North American rights deal with HarperOne for his latest, The End of Dieting. Gideon Weil, v-p and executive editor at the imprint, negotiated with Brian Defiore at Defiore and Company, and the book is set for January 2014. Eat to Live was published by Little, Brown in 2003 and has been a consistent seller for the house, which has said that it’s sold more than 700,000 copies to date. HC said End of Dieting, which offers the author’s own nutrition plan, is a “paradigm-shifting manifesto” that highlights “the very real dangers of the diet explosion, and describ[es] how the resulting medical issues are the direct result of our dietary choices.”
The Experiment Explores Its ‘Lower GI’
At the Experiment, Matthew Lore and Cara Bedick bought North American rights to bestseller Dr. Jennie Brand-Miller’s The Low GI Eating Plan for an Optimal Pregnancy. Fiona Hazard at Hachette Australia did the licensing deal, and The Experiment will publish the book in April 2013. The publisher said there are more than 3.5 million copies of Brand-Miller’s books in print. This acquisition also marks something of a reunion, as Lore acquired the author’s first book, The Glucose Revolution, in 1998, when he was at Marlowe & Company. This title is Brand-Miller’s first book in six years.
Norton Oinks for Estabrook
John Glusman at Norton bought North American rights to Barry Estabrook’s new book about meat production, Pig Tales, from David Black at the David Black Agency. Estabrook, a food writer and author of Tomatoland (as well as a two-time winner of the James Beard Award), focuses on the conditions under which pigs, slated for mass consumption, are slaughtered, which Glusman said are “horrific.” The book also features a recipe for fixing the system, Glusman added, as Estabrook “advocates a more humane, organic alternative already being pursued by a new generation of farmers raising heritage breeds.” Pig Tales is scheduled for spring 2015.
Long Goes In for Five at Philomel
Michael Green at Philomel signed bestselling author/illustrator Loren Long to a world rights, five-book deal, negotiating with agent Steven Malk at Writers House. The titles will all be picture books, and the first, set for fall 2013, will be Christmas-themed and feature the author’s popular character Otis the tractor. Philomel said that Long is also working on a book featuring a new character.
Gustafson’s Debut Goes to Rodale
Food activist and social entrepreneur Ellen Gustafson closed her first book deal, contracting with Rodale for two titles. Gustafson, a former U.N. spokesperson and co-founder of FEED Projects (a charitable company that sells various products to combat world hunger), closed the deal with editor-at-large Elissa Altman and executive editor Alex Postman, who pre-empted world English rights from the Guild Agency’s James Marshall Reilly. The first book, scheduled for spring 2014, Rodale said, will be about “how we have the power to improve our health, our communities and the world... from our kitchen table.” The second title will be a cookbook featuring sustainable recipes; it’s slated for spring 2015.
