DEAL OF THE WEEK
Goffe Finds “Eden” at Doubleday
Tao Leigh Goffe sold After Eden to Doubleday for six figures. Thomas Gebremedhin bought North American rights at auction, with Doubleday calling the title “a hemispheric investigation of the Caribbean as both an idyll in the Western imagination and as a dark laboratory of Western experimentation.” Goffe, a historian and assistant professor at Cornell, uses a mix of research and her own family history to, Doubleday went on, “radically transform how we conceive of race, natural history, colonialism, and the climate crisis.” Ian Bonaparte at Janklow & Nesbit sold the book, which is set for fall 2024.
Brisack Helps “Organize” Astra House
For Astra House, Alessandra Bastagli bought world rights to Jaz Brisack’s Get on the Job and Organize. The barista, who was one of the leaders of the recent union drive at a Buffalo, N.Y., Starbucks, was represented by Don Congdon Associates literary agent Katie Kotchman. The publisher said the book relies on a “character-driven narrative of the Starbucks unionization to tell the broader story of the new, nationwide labor movement unfolding in this era of political and social unrest.” The book is set for spring 2024.
Penguin Buys Finebaum’s Pigskin Book
In a world English rights agreement, Scott Moyers at Penguin Press bought a currently untitled book by sports radio broadcaster Paul Finebaum. The title explores the rivalry between University of Alabama coach Nick Saban and two of his protégés, Jimbo Fischer at Texas A&M and Kirby Smart at the University of Georgia. Elaborating, Penguin said it examines each coach’s hunt “for college football supremacy” against the backdrop of new rules coming into college football allowing athletes to be paid for the use of their image. The switch “has already resulted in multimillion-dollar payments to recruits, and threatens to make a very competitive arena even more existentially brutal, and ruinously expensive for all but the wealthiest college donor bases.” Finebaum was represented by David Vigliano at Vigliano Associates and is writing the currently unscheduled book with John Talty.
Mahloudji’s Debut Goes to Scribner
With a preempt, Kara Watson at Scribner bought Sanam Mahloudji’s debut novel, The Persians. The Pushcart Prize–winning author follows five women in an Iranian family from the 1940s through 2006. The fading clan sees the women appear in various settings—from Tehran to New York to Aspen—as, the publisher said, “the outrageous act of one of the women pulls the family into existential crisis.” Emma Paterson at U.K. shingle Aitken Alexander handled the North American rights agreement for the author, who lives in London. The Persians is scheduled for spring 2024.
Crown Nabs Brown’s Reparations Book
The Whiteness of Wealth by Dorothy Brown was acquired, in a world rights agreement, by Crown. Madhulika Sikka bought the currently unscheduled titled from Alia Hanna Habib at the Gernert Company. In the book, Brown, a law professor at Georgetown University, offers a history of reparations in the United States, arguing, Crown said, “for a new path forward to restorative justice.”
MTV Books Catches Kraus’s Thriller
For MTV Books, Christian Trimmer bought Whalefall by Daniel Kraus (The Shape of Water). The thriller, set for summer 2023, will be released through a partnership with Atria Books. The publisher said it is “a scientifically accurate chronicle of a young man’s fight to survive after being swallowed by a 65-ton sperm whale.” Richard Abate at 3 Arts handled the world rights agreement for Kraus.
Correction: An earlier version of this article gave the incorrect title for Daniel Kraus's forthcoming novel; its Whalefall, not Whitefall.
