Pearson Creates ‘Distress’ At Norton
Norton editor-in-chief John Glusman took world English rights, at auction, to No Apparent Distress, a nonfiction book by Rachel Pearson. Glusman beat out five other editors for the book, which chronicles the author’s experiences training to become a doctor. Pearson, who was represented by Zoë Pagnamenta at the Zoë Pagnamenta Agency, attended Columbia's M.F.A. program and is currently enrolled in an M.D./Ph.D. program at the University of Texas Medical Branch, and the Institute for the Medical Humanities (in Galveston). She has written a number of essays for the Texas Observer on, as Glusman put it, “[being at] the heart of the American healthcare crisis: in the public hospitals, free clinics, and prisons.” Those pieces have gotten, according to Norton, over 50,000 Facebook shares. Additionally, Pearson has appeared on MSNBC’s All In, with Chris Hayes. The book is currently set for release in fall 2016.
Dickey ‘Haunts’ Viking
Colin Dickey sold, Ghostland: An American History in Haunted Places, to Viking’s Melanie Tortoroli. Anna Sproul-Latimer at the Ross Yoon Agency represented the author, taking North American rights to the book at auction. Dickey is the manager of the Morbid Anatomy Museum in Brooklyn and has contributed to the Paris Review and Lapham’s Quarterly. The book, Viking said, reveals some of the country’s most haunted places as “the keepers of a shadow American history—one very different than what appears in textbooks.” Sproul-Latimer pitched the book as what might result “if Simon Winchester and Walter Benjamin had a love child.”
Candlewick Re-ups Caldecott Winner
For Candlewick Press, Sarah Ketchersid bought world rights to two new picture books by David Ezra Stein. Stein won the Caldecott Honor in 2011 for his picture book Interrupting Chickens (also published by Candlewick), and, among other honors, his picture book Leaves (Putnam) was named one of PW’s Best Books of the Year in 2007. Stein was represented by Holly McGhee at Pippin Properties, and the first book in the new deal, tentatively titled Ice Boy, follows, she explained, “an intrepid ice cube.” The second book features “an impatient kernel of corn named Cornelius.” Ice Boy is slated for 2017, and the second book will be released in 2018.
Correction: After further details were provided about Colin Dickey's deal announcement, this article has been updated to reflect the fact that Ghostland is not his debut work. Additionally, an earlier version of this article stated that Rachel Pearson has an M.F.A. from Columbia; Pearson attended the program, but did not earn a degree from it.
