Thomas Dunne Adjusts Its ‘Sound’
At Macmillan’s Thomas Dunne Books imprint, Rob Kirkpatrick took North American rights to Kent Hartman’s Sound City: Big Hits, Fast Times, and Epic Tales from Inside Rock and Roll’s Legendary Studio. Hartman (The Wrecking Crew) was represented by Helen Zimmermann, who has an eponymous shingle. Kirkpatrick said the book will offer a peek at the goings-on inside the iconic Los Angeles recording studio and the making of hit albums by acts ranging from Nirvana to Neil Young.
Dutton Inks Ryan to Double
Carrie Ryan, author of the YA hit The Forest of Hands and Teeth, signed a two-book, world English rights deal with Dutton Children’s Books. The first title, a YA romantic thriller, is called Turnabout. Julie Strauss-Gabel, at Dutton, struck the deal with Merrilee Heifetz at Writers House. Turnabout—which follows a young woman who, Dutton said, is “thrust into a web of intrigue...in a dangerous campaign to avenge her parents’ murders,”—is scheduled for early 2015. Forest of Hands and Teeth, the first title in a YA zombie trilogy published by Random House’s Delacorte Press in 2009, per Dutton, has been translated into over 18 languages and is currently in feature film development.
Cao ReUps at Viking
Carole DeSanti, at Viking, bought world rights to the second novel by Lan Cao. DeSanti negotiated the sale with Ellen Geiger at the Frances Goldin Agency, and the book, called The Lotus and the Storm, is scheduled for summer 2014. Cao’s debut, 1997’s Monkey Bridge, was well received critically and marked, the Penguin imprint noted, the first account of the Vietnam War by a Vietnamese-American. Cao teaches law at the College of William and Mary.
Twitter Star to Scribner
Brant Rumble, at Scribner, bought North American rights to Megan Amram’s Science…for Her! Amram developed a hefty Twitter following—over 350,000—which she parlayed into a job writing for the NBC sitcom Parks and Recreation. The book is envisioned, Rumble said, as a “faux-expert compendium of scientific knowledge” that will play on the “satirical conceit that ‘science is hard for most people, let alone women.’” In describing Amram’s comedic style, Rumble said she blends “the off-beat humor of Amy Sedaris with the mock-expert conceit of John Hodgman.” Claudia Ballard at William Morris Endeavor represented Amram.
B’bury & Browning Get Sexual
Frank Browning, NPR Paris correspondent, sold The End of Gender to Anton Mueller at Bloomsbury. Agent Jennifer Lyons, at the Jennifer Lyons Agency, brokered the world rights deal. Bloomsbury said the nonfiction title will offer a “widely reported look at the rapidly changing landscape of gender” touching on everything from the rise of women in the workplace to gender-neutral parenting.
Briefs
At Viking Studio, Lucia Watson took North American rights to Whiskey Distilled: A Populist Guide to the Water of Life. Author Heather Greene, who has the unique credit of being New York City’s first female whiskey sommelier, was represented by agents Charlie Olsen and Kimberley Witherspoon at Inkwell Management. The agency said the book will address the fast-growing connoisseurship of the spirit as well as basic knowledge—it answers questions about whether scotch is a whiskey (it is), and whether bourbon can come from places other than Kentucky (it can). Greene is the director of whiskey education at the Flatiron Room.
