Goldstein Mixes Her Chemistry at HMH
At auction, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt’s Elizabeth Bewley won North American rights to Meredith Goldstein’s debut YA novel, Chemistry Lessons. Goldstein (The Singles), an entertainment reporter who also writes the “Love Letters” advice column for the Boston Globe, follows a “science whiz kid” in the novel who attempts to, as HMH put it, “crack the chemical equation for lasting love.” When the plan goes awry, she instead “wreaks havoc on herself and the boys in her life.” Katherine Flynn at Kneerim & Williams brokered the two-book deal for Goldstein.
Nation Books Collects Moore’s ‘Ashes’
Katy O’Donnell at Nation Books took North American rights to No Ashes in the Fire, Darnell Moore’s memoir. Moore, an activist and one of the founders of the Black Lives Matter movement, tells his own coming-of-age story in the book, while offering advice on creating change in society. Katie Kotchman at Don Congdon Associates, who sold the book, said not only is it about “Moore’s survival story,” it also delivers “a blueprint for the future of the fight to end oppression in the U.S.”
Aladdin Gets ‘Halfway Normal’ with Dee
Barbara Dee (Star-Crossed) sold North American rights to her latest middle-grade novel, Halfway Normal, to Alyson Heller at Simon & Schuster’s Aladdin imprint. The book, which was sold by Jill Grinberg at Jill Grinberg Literary Management, is slated for December 2017. It follows a seventh grader who is readjusting to life after two years of leukemia treatments. The publisher elaborated, saying, “Not wanting to be treated as Cancer Girl and fearing her classmates won’t understand, she refuses to share her experience—until an unexpected assignment from her English teacher gives her the perfect opportunity.”
Gandhi’s Grandson Lands at Jeter Imprint
For Simon & Schuster’s Jeter Publishing imprint, Mitchell Ivers bought North American and open market rights to Arun Gandhi’s The Gift of Anger. The book, which is subtitled And Other Lessons from My Grandfather Mahatma Gandhi, is scheduled for May 2017. The author, who is one of Gandhi’s grandsons, was taught as a boy to deal with his anger issues using principles of nonviolence. The book, S&S said, “reveals 10 vital and extraordinary life lessons he learned from his legendary grandfather about the true path from anger to peace.” Gandhi, a former journalist for the Times of India, is the founder of the M.K. Gandhi Institute for Nonviolence.
William Morrow Inks Barclay to Triple
Bestselling author Linwood Barclay (No Time for Goodbye) signed a three-book U.S. rights deal, for three new standalone thrillers, with Jennifer Brehl at William Morrow. Brehl preempted the books from Helen Heller, who has an eponymous shingle. The first title in the deal, The Typewriter, is about a man who gets an antique typewriter and begins to think he may be receiving communications on it from two murder victims who once used the machine. The book is set for a spring 2018 release.
Briefs
In a North American rights deal, Rose Hilliard at St. Martin’s Press bought three new books by Emily March in her Eternal Springs series. The contemporary romance series is set in a small town and the books under this deal, which are mass market, are scheduled to start being published in spring 2017; first up is A Stardance Summer. Meg Ruley and Christina Hogrebe at the Jane Rotrosen Agency represented March.
Kimberly Arcand and Megan Watzke sold world rights to a currently untitled science book to Becky Koh at Black Dog & Leventhal The book was sold by Laura Biagi at the Jean V. Naggar Literary Agency. Biagi said the work examines “the most fascinating orders of magnitude throughout the universe, from the smallest known objects to the largest.” It will be illustrated by Katie Peek, the graphics editor at Popular Science.
Chris Heiser at Unnamed Press, an L.A.-based indie, took North American rights to Jessie Chaffee’s debut novel, Florence in Ecstasy. Sarah Burnes at the Gernert Company, who sold the book, said it follows a young American “in the throes of an existential reckoning following an eating disorder as she attempts to rebuild herself in Florence, Italy.”
Correction: An earlier version of this story misspelled the name of agent Katie Kotchman. Additionally, the book that Kimberly Arcand and Megan Watzke sold is untitled; this story previously cited the book they sold as their already-published work, Light: The Visible Spectrum and Beyond.
