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NEWS REVIEW
08.06.18
www.thebookseller.com
PRIZES
RIGHTS DEAL
Shamsie wins Women’s Prize BY KATHERINE COWDREY
FIRST-TIME AUTHOR’S ZHIVAGO TALE SIGNED FOR $2M An American début author has secured a $2m advance in the US for her “sensational” historical novel, with Hutchinson winning the rights in the UK in a high six-figure deal after a 12-publisher auction. Jordan Pavlin, vice-president and executive editor at Knopf, bought North American rights to Lara Prescott’s We Were Never Here, based on the writing and publishing of the novel Doctor Zhivago, in a deal understood to be worth $2m (£1.5m), negotiated by Jeff Kleinman and Jamie Chambliss of Folio Literary Management. In the UK, Penguin Random House publisher Selina Walker won UK and Commonwealth rights (excluding Canada), following a 12-publisher auction managed by Lorella Belli of the Lorella Belli Literary Agency. Doctor Zhivago takes place
between the Russian Revolution of 1905 and the Second World War. It was banned in Russia because it was considered anti-Soviet, but smuggled to Italy, where it was published in 1957. Prescott’s novel tells the story of how Doctor Zhivago was written and published through the voices of those involved, including author Boris Pasternak’s mistress and muse, Olga Ivinskaya; the women of the CIA typing pool; college graduates and former spies, all of whom were involved in smuggling the book back in to Russia “in a clandestine mission to weaponise literature”. Hutchinson will publish in spring 2020. The work had sold in 12 other territories by the time The Bookseller went to press.
Kamila Shamsie right has been awarded the £30,000 Women’s Prize for Fiction for her “extraordinarily topical” novel Home Fire (Bloomsbury Circus). The win sees the British author take the prize after being shortlisted twice before, in 2009 and 2015. She was the second favourite to win, at odds of 3/1, and triumphed over the bookies’ favourite, Bloomsbury-stablemate Jesmyn Ward, who was shortlisted for her third novel Sing, Unburied, Sing.
Home Fire, Shamsie’s seventh
novel, explores the bond between three British Pakistani siblings, one of whom leaves for Syria. It was saluted for the “quality of the prose” as well as for its “big themes”, and hailed as a book “for our times”. Following several hours of deliberations, the decision to crown Shamsie the winner was “unanimous”, according to chair of the judges Sarah Sands, editor of BBC Radio 4’s “Today” programme, who was joined on the panel by broadcaster Anita Anand, comedian and actor Katy Brand, co-founder of the Women’s Equality
COMPANY NEWS Waterstones sale to Elliott now complete
The purchase of Waterstones by Elliott Advisors has been completed. It was revealed in April that the European private
equity arm of the American hedge fund had bought a majority stake in the retailer, with previous owner Alexander Mamut’s Lynwood Investments retaining a minority stake, although the percentage of the business each owns has not been disclosed. James Daunt, who remains chief executive of
the retailer, told The Bookseller: “We announced in April the acquisition of a majority interest in Waterstones by Elliott Advisors. The purchase has now completed. We have a new owner, then: signed,
sealed and the keys handed over. We are very pleased to welcome them.” The terms of the deal have not been disclosed, but Elliott provided all the financing for the transaction, including ongoing financial and operational considerations. Daunt’s key leadership team will also remain in
place at Waterstones following the deal. Publishers, agents and authors have welcomed the fact that Daunt has been retained by the new owners, along with his management team. The firm is expected to appoint a new board of directors in due course.
Party Catherine Mayer and actor Imogen Stubbs. “In the end we chose the book
that we felt spoke for our times,” said Sands on behalf of the judges. “Home Fire is about identity, conflicting loyalties, love and politics. And it sustains mastery of its themes and its form. It is a remarkable book, which we passionately recommend.” She told The Bookseller it had
been “extremely tough” to make a decision but they had all agreed on Home Fire as “a book for now”
and felt it was “lasting, relevant and pertinent”. “[When discussing Home Fires]
we covered the sum of human experience, discussing love and death and violence and race and conflicting loyalties. There were no small themes here. To humanise the big political stories that we are talking about, of terrorism, and to see it from the inside—the subtlety and the nuance and the idea of people being tested, what it means to be British or what it means to be a Muslim—it felt ‘of now’. And she does it so well.” Books on the “dazzling” shortlist
explored themes as varied as mermaids and courtesans in Georgian London, the history of race in America, and domestic violence. Along with Ward, Shamsie triumphed over novels by Imogen Hermes Gowar, Jessie Greengrass, Elif Batuman and Meena Kandasamy. This is the 23rd year of the prize, which is open to any woman writing in English, regardless of nationality, country of residence, age or subject matter. The 2018 prize was supported by three sponsors: Baileys, Deloitte and NatWest.
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