Adult Newsletter: January 2018

Up And Coming For Submission

NON-FICTION

Politics used to be compared to “playing hardball”—named for the act of throwing a baseball at maximum speed just under a batter’s chin—but that’s no longer the case. Politics can now better be defined as “playing spitball”—named after the wobbly, unsportsmanlike pitch thrown to fool a batter into swinging wildly and missing. SPITBALL by Taegan D. Goddard and David T.S. Jonas will explain how politics changed over the last three decades and how everyone can use the new rules to their advantage, both in and outside the political arena. Nearly thirty years after Chris Matthews’s perennial bestseller Hardball, which this book’s title and theme play off of, the rules of politics have dramatically evolved. While hardball politics is still played, success today depends more on being able to hit (or at least dodge) the ever-increasing number of spitballs. E-mails can be hacked and leaked, political opponents might be working with foreign governments, and operatives can use software to draw district lines down to a single house to guarantee one party stays in power in perpetuity.  Thanks to the rise of social media, changing societal attitudes, and a vastly different electorate that shows up to vote, American politics has never been so accessible, yet so difficult to figure out. SPITBALL will uncover the new rules left in the wake of Donald Trump, Barack Obama, and other political leaders who have used the conflicting (and often unarticulated) motivations of voters to win elections. More importantly, it will show how today’s most influential political actors—from Steve Bannon to Ivanka Trump to Bernie Sanders—use these new rules to jockey for advantage and advance their agendas, even when they “lose.”

Sarah Kieffer is the author of The Vanilla Bean Baking Book and the face behind both The Vanilla Bean Blog, and an Instagram account with well over 100,000 followers (@sarah_kieffer), which just features baked goods. Her new project, COOKIE BOOK is a generous collection of cookies and bars, including her famous “pan-banging” cookies, which went viral, and which The New York Times called a “leap forward in cookie technology.” From chapters that include classic, simple, and quick, to modern, quirky, and indulgent, this book will have something for every cookie lover and maker. Sarah baked at various coffeehouses and bakeries across Minnesota before starting her blog and in 2014, won Saveur’s Best Baking & Desserts Blog Award. Since that time Sarah’s Instagram account has been growing steadily, and her frequent Instagram posts of chocolate chip cookies have earned her a devoted following.

“Fruit is a gamble,” Seinfeld famously declared, and for virtually everyone it remains a mystery. At its best (a prime Ashmead’s Kernel apple or Snow Queen nectarine), fruit can be sublime as a fine wine; at its worst, it exemplifies the discontents of industrialization. So many factors determine fruit quality—variety, growing area, farming practices, ripeness at harvest, postharvest—that one needs a lifetime’s experience to understand and explain them, but until now there has been no such thing as a “fruit critic” to guide general readers. There have been plenty of books about cooking or growing fruit, and a few in-depth works about individual fruits, but nothing that tells the broader story of the fruit we eat. Now David Karp – celebrated in The New Yorker as The Fruit Detective – combines the perspectives of a quarter century as a journalist, scientist, and grower in THE GRAND UNIFIED THEORY OF FRUIT. In it, he explains the history of fruit from its ancient origins to modern health crazes and scams; the elements of fruit flavor, including its chemical bases; how selection and breeding have transformed fruit; and how readers can recognize and get the best of fruit, from supermarkets, farmers markets, and home gardens. From the “Pear Mania” of 19th century Boston gentlemen to current political and economic headlines—surging imports, mechanized harvests, and the privatization of fruit as intellectual property—Karp melds personal experience and exacting research, treating fruit as a mirror of our world.

Mike McCurry quit as President Clinton's press secretary after he found out he had inadvertently lied to the American people and the press corps when he reported Clinton's now infamous "I did not have sex with that woman" claim. For McCurry, his credibility was everything. Sean Spicer worked for six months for President Trump after lying about the size of an inaugural crowd. Sarah Huckabee Sanders continues the tradition. When did lying become so commonplace in the White House? Did it start with Nixon? Roosevelt? Or, has the Trump administration—while setting precedence for the amount of prevarication—merely carried on a tradition as rich and as long as the presidency itself? BUT HEAR ME OUT… explores the depth of lying in the current White House and puts it in historic context with every other president, starting with the very beginning of the republic. It examines how the explosive revelations of The Pentagon Papers shattered the innocence of the people, who for the first time began to think the White House routinely lied to them. This led to our current suspicion of those in power lying to "help elevate the level of discussion" of serious issues. BUT HEAR ME OUT… is written by Brian J. Karem, author of six books, two bestsellers, a veteran White House reporter, a defender of the first amendment and famous for mixing it up with President George H.W. Bush and President Donald Trump.

Thousands of feet above sea level, on a plateau in the central Andean region, Mother Nature grows killer potatoes. These tubers contain a smorgasbord of chemicals that can irritate your mouth, land you with a fever, or make you lose your lunch (in both directions). If you eat enough of them, the chemicals within can kill. But there’s a way to eat your fill and live to tell the tale: dip the potatoes in a clay sauce. Eating crushed, rocky dirt as a side dish might be one of the first things humans did to process a raw, wild ingredient from Nature and make it into something we can use—but it certainly wasn’t the last. INGREDIENTS by George Zaidan will explore how we take plants, animals, earth, and ocean and transform them into Cheetos, Windex, lipstick, and Viagra. Our ability to change our chemical landscape didn’t spring up overnight. We have a long and sometimes surprising history of shaping Nature to fit our needs, and it started innocently enough. Our ancestors who lived thousands of years ago, processed nature to feed and protect the next generation. We do so much more. We engineer foods, try to engineer human attraction, and try to eradicate disease. All this processing may be impacting our health—as individuals and as a species. So it’s time to ask ourselves: are we changing Nature too much?  Zaidan, who trained in chemistry at MIT and created the hit digital series Ingredients for National Geographic, tells the story of the chemicals in your cleaners, the byproducts in your beauty supplies, and the additives in your apple juice: the stuff inside your stuff.

With two great kids, two beautiful houses, and a happy marriage to her college sweetheart, Laura Euler had the perfect life—or so she thought. Then, one afternoon, with her husband gone on yet another business trip, she picked up his old cellphone by mistake and saw a text from a woman called Starla, telling her husband she missed him. He had replied with a heart emoji. (“Seriously?” a friend said. “Dave went to Yale.”) Just like that, Euler’s perfect life was over. This was the worst thing that could possibly have happened—until she saw the video on the cellphone. (Yes. There was video.) Things came apart quickly: her husband moved to Brooklyn with his special lady, the kids went to college, Euler’s beautiful house was sold, and she had to start over at the age of 48. Miserable, she retreated to the town that had always represented happiness to her: Montauk, Long Island, known as “The End.”  THE END documents the loss of Euler’s marriage, her home, her children’s innocence, her parents, not to mention her 401K, but how she emerged humbled, resilient, defiant, and always sardonically funny. It’s a wild ride of a story, as Euler is investigated by CPS, buys jail clothes for her son after his DUI, sells family heirlooms to pay for lawyers (criminal and divorce), drives frantically with cash to the electric company to avoid a turn-off, breaks up with old friends and makes new ones, gets on first name terms with the bail bondsman, wheels her mother around after her stroke, Facebook-stalks her husband and his new lady, and arranges her father’s funeral, all while blogging about the Hamptons and getting tipsy at fancy parties with famous people . (Listen, Mr. De Niro, she said she was sorry.) Ultimately, THE END is a hilarious, poignant, and touching story of betrayal, survival, and reinvention set in a magical place.

What happens to your body as you’re dying? What does it actually feel like? When a hospice nurse offered to answer those questions for Jennie Dear and her dying mother, they were at first shocked, then curious, then finally, strongly relieved. They wanted to know. In the course of six-and-a-half years of cancer treatments for Dear’s mother, not once had anyone talked to them about what she would experience as she died. That question and answer led to WHAT DOES IT FEEL LIKE TO DIE? Since that moment, Dear has used her background as a former journalist and English professor as she interviewed doctors, nurses, psychiatrists and other palliative care experts, who are finding methods to help dying people cope, and even grow and develop in their last weeks of life. She shares their straightforward answers to questions about dying: Does it hurt? Where do people die? How do most people die? What she’s learned is sometimes surprising, sometimes reassuring, and often revealing.

Brett Rounsaville had his dream job. For years he had worked toward becoming a theme park designer and finally, his work was seen by millions each year at Disneyland. Everything was going according to plan until the evening he made a life-changing mistake. He wrote down the rest of his goals. Suddenly he had a list of fifty things he had always wanted to do staring him in the face every morning, mocking him for leaving them unaccomplished day after day. (And you can only be mocked by an inanimate piece of paper for so long before you snap.) Instead of waking up twenty-five years later with a long career and a mind full of regrets, he decided to set out into the unknown. Armed with nothing but a list of offbeat objectives, a backpack full of technology to document the adventure and a quickly emptied savings account, he vowed not to return home until he accomplished everything on his list, all without spending a single dime on lodging. After almost a year and a half of sleeping on sidewalks and strangers’ couches while crisscrossing North America to pet a sloth, milk a cow on an Amish farm, hang glide, and fire Donald Trump (among 46 other goals), he finally came home with a greater understanding of himself, more than a few life lessons and the love of a woman who would become his wife. LIVING A LIFETIME IN 479 DAYS says with authority that no one has to be at death's door to have lived life. Rounsaville and his adventures have been featured on Good Morning America, Fox News, CNN and dozens of other outlets. So: the first step to ruining a comfortable, albeit uneventful, life? Write down your goals.

Based on a remarkable archive lost for a century, THE BLOOD BOOKS: Science and Sensation at the Dawn of American Forensics, follows the story of John George Spenzer, an illustrious international chemist and Cleveland’s foremost forensics expert, who made his courtroom debut in the brutal 1908 murder of a young girl. Spenzer demonstrated that blood smearing the suspect’s coat belonged to the victim. But in the American courtroom, science didn’t convince jurors. They ignored his “proof” in favor of the sensational headlines. And in the “Metropolis of the Midwest,” rampant growth brought wealth to some, but squalor, deprivation, and violence to far more. The “Cleveland problem” soon attracted national scrutiny. Criminologists considered it the prototype of a new American reality—population explosion, immigration, and ineffective policing. Galvanized by his early failure to sway a jury, Spenzer resolved to bring science to the courtroom. He collected strange cases from Cleveland’s “vampires” to New York’s “hidden mistress,” marshaling the methods of sensationalist reporting to make science, and the scientific expert, the key to uncovering truth.  By the end of the decade, the doctor would confront his greatest test. An innocent man faced wrongful accusation and the hangman’s noose, forcing Spenzer to explore the darker side of courtroom spectacle. How far should a scientist distort the facts to convince a jury of the truth? The answer would have long-lasting impact for a nation on the verge of its first forensic age. Author Brandy Schillace, PHD is Senior Research Associate and Public Engagement Fellow for the Dittrick Museum of Medical History at Case Western Reserve University and Editor in Chief for BMJ’s Medical Humanities Journal. (Please note, this project is represented by Jessica Papin.)

What if a single simple solution could simultaneously double global economic growth, expand market share for companies in dozens of industries and improve the quality of health, education, food security and water around the world? Ensuring women’s universal access to financial services can do exactly that.  Women are the world’s largest emerging market, with greater potential to impact the global economy than India and China combined.  Over one billion women remain completely unserved by the formal financial system, while another 2 billion have access to nothing more than a “no frills” bank account. Beyond this story of global impact, though, is the equally profound relationship between a woman’s financial independence and her sense of autonomy, physical security and self-esteem – a relationship that plays out in the lives of women in both developed and developing countries. THERE’S NOTHING MICRO ABOUT A BILLION WOMEN is the first book to incorporate both large macroeconomic themes and the more deeply personal ones into a single compelling narrative and call to action. A veteran of Wall Street and the World Bank, author Mary Ellen Iskenderian is the CEO of Women’s World Banking, the only global organization dedicated to women’s financial empowerment in the developing world.  In this timely, groundbreaking book, she illuminates the links between financial participation and power, and explores the transformation that is possible for families, communities and the world when women are full economic citizens.  Iskenderian, who holds an MBA from Yale and BS from the Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service, is a permanent member of the Council on Foreign Relations; she speaks internationally on the subject of women’s financial participation. (Please note, this project is represented by Jessica Papin.)

When entrepreneur and scientist Bob Quinn returned to his family’s Montana farm, he realized the crop they grew – wheat -- was trying to tell him something. Among the first plants domesticated by humans, this nutrient-dense grain remains the most widely planted crop today.  But over fifteen percent of Americans can no longer eat it – and given the changes in farming, Bob wasn’t sure he could make a living growing it. What went wrong with wheat, and what can its revival teach us about America’s future?

ADDING VALUE: Reclaiming Our Food, Our Health & Our Planet from the Ravages of the Cheap Commodity Economy chronicles Quinn’s forty-year journey to answer that question, which has led the successful entrepreneur to reexamine nearly everything he was taught about food, agriculture, business, health, and the trajectory of American society.  In those three decades, Quinn transformed from a UC Davis plant biochemistry PhD deeply skeptical of organic farming to an organic food champion whose reintroduction of ancient grain has changed the way we eat. He collaborated with medical researchers to learn surprising truths about how modern, chemically-raised wheat varieties – cheap food – are affecting our bodies, and how heirloom organic grain is different. He also began growing his own energy and raising vegetables without irrigation. In the vein of The Third Plate and Deep Economy, and co-written by Quinn and Lentil Underground author Liz Carlisle, Adding Value is a ground-breaking look at the new economy just beginning to take shape.  Part prescription for reversing economic decline in rural America, part roadmap for remaking our food systems, ADDING VALUE is the story that reexamines our very notion of progress. (Please note, this project is represented by Jessica Papin.)

The current political situation finds many of us wanting change but few of us knowing how to achieve it. AIDS activism was the most recent successful social movement in America, and now is the time to examine how ACT UP transformed our country and the world. From 1981, when the US medical establishment acknowledged the existence of the epidemic, to 1986, 40,000 people died of AIDS in the United States and zero progress was made in developing effective treatments. In 1987, ACT UP, the AIDS Coalition To Unleash Power, was formed to force pharmaceutical companies into medical research and to change social attitudes. Through direct action, they pressured the medical establishment to research effective and innovative approaches to AIDS medication; waged a successful four-year campaign to win benefits and treatment for women with HIV; started Housing Works, an agency that provides housing for homeless people with HIV; won legal needle exchange in New York; defeated the Catholic Church’s campaign against condoms in schools by bringing 7,000 people to disrupt mass at Saint Patrick’s Cathedral; along with many other achievements. As a result of their work, today someone infected with HIV can get treatments that will allow them to live a full life span, and when virally suppressed, they are incapable of infecting another person. This is a significant change with enormous impact on individual lives, larger communities, and the broader society. In the oral history LET THE RECORD SHOW, author, playwright, professor and activist Sarah Schulman will excavate and detail the specifics of how ACT UP was one of the most effective—yet overlooked—social movements in the world, and how their structure of diverse democracy and simultaneity of approach is still effective and relevant to today’s activists. (Please note, this project is represented by Michael Bourret.)

Your parents have sloppy, scary secrets. Eventually, these secrets will become your truths. When she was in middle school, writer and longtime Mortified producer Sara Faith Alterman found the skeleton in her prudish parents’ closet. It was naked. All skeletons are naked, technically, but this skeleton was a novelty sex book called Games You Can Play with Your Pussy. It was not a book about cats. It was, however, written by Sara’s strict suburban dad, Ira. Sara found more novelty sex books in the closet that day, all written by her father, all joining hands to warp her perception of sex, body image, and fathers forever. It was different than other games middle school kids play in closets. Less “seven minutes in heaven,” and more “two minutes in Freudian hell.”  I’m never going to think about these books again, Sara decided. Of course, she thought about them, every day, for decades. Until she was getting ready to have a child of her own. Until her dad developed early onset Alzheimer’s disease and announced that he’d be reviving his sex writing career...with Sara’s help. THE BEGINNER’S GUIDE TO SEX AND DEATH is a cringe-worthy and charming collection of interconnected essays loosely based on a piece Sara wrote for the New York Times that explores the bizarre dichotomy of simultaneously losing a parent while gaining a child. They are funny and heartbreaking, absent of the self-conscious ALL-CAPS FRENZY that sometimes punctuate these kinds of memoirs. Instead, you’ll find frank and funny confessions of the heart from a woman who has spent years trying to find humor in the perverse and optimism in darkness. Readers who love comic explorations of mortality, such as the works of David Sedaris, Jenny Lawson, and Dave Eggers, (plus, the brilliant TV show The Good Place) will fall hard for Sara's unique and inviting nonfiction debut.  (Please note, this project is represented by Stacey Glick.)

What if instead of destroying Goliath, David had befriended him? This is the surprising but true story of what happens when we engage in the hard work of befriending the enemy. Through the author’s unique voice as a mother of three and seasoned activist, Leah Garces’s WALKING WITH GOLIATH, pulls lessons from her experiences advocating for change within the meat industry. She tells the entertaining, unexpected and thought-provoking stories of a motley crew of change makers she’s encountered from whistleblower rural American farmers to corporate executives to hardcore activists. Together they create the rocky formula for progress. Her unlikely partnership with whistleblower factory farmer Craig Watts would change her understanding of how social progress is made. Their story, depicted in the New York Times, went viral and sent ripples of reform throughout the chicken industry. She depicts a revolution within the meat industry where opposing forces find commonality. Drawing on historical examples, she demonstrates using this path to social progress not only alters the course of history, but ultimately our understanding of who we are. It requires letting go of ‘us and them’ and accepting that there is only ‘us’. The author is a big voice in the field and has a significant platform that she can use to promote a book, starting with Compassion in World Farming's 1.2 million members worldwide, and broadening to include connections to other membership organizations, celebrities like Evanna Lynch (who played Luna Lovegood in the Harry Potter films) and notable figures like John Mackey, the founder of Whole Foods. As someone with seasoned media relations, her work has been covered across diverse media platforms. (Please note, this project is represented by Stacey Glick.)

We’ve all side-eyed the chipper runners jogging by at 6 am in their short-shorts and sports bras and felt a little envious, despite our simmering resentment. How do they get out there and do it every morning? How did they become Runners? Though, theoretically, running is one of the most natural sports for humans, the general responses to running tend to be, “It’s hard. It sucks. I wish I could do it.” For those who wish they liked running, but actually hate it, Lisa Jhung’s RUNNING THAT DOESN’T SUCK has arrived. In this pithy, humorous, and down-to-earth guide, Jhung gets back to basics, breaking down the barriers for aspiring runners.  She encourages readers to “embrace the suckiness” and gives advice on how to get started—and how to keep going. (Hint: You don’t have to run at 6 am, or wear short-shorts.) Jhung also offers body maintenance and nutrition tips, plus running etiquette pointers. Smartly organized, with chapters that don’t necessarily need to be read in order, a fun and illustrative style, and loaded with insights from professional runners, sports psychologists, coaches, physical therapists and more, RUNNING THAT DOESN’T SUCK has all the meat an aspiring runner might need to get hooked on the sport. Lisa Jhung has been a journalist in the outdoor industry for 20 years, writing about adventure, running, endurance and outdoor sports and the gear that goes with them for multiple magazines such as: Cosmo, Fitness, Men’s Health, Men’s Fitness, Men’s Journal, Mental Floss, Outside, Runner’s World, SELF, SHAPE, and more. Jhung is a contributing editor to Runner’s World and previously managed Runnersworld.com’s trail running microsite for five years. (Please note, this project is represented by Amy Elizabeth Bishop.)

FICTION

Seth Ellington is the perfect husband: handsome, attentive, and supportive. To all three of his wives. They’ve never met, and to each other they are known only as Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday. Thursday, Seth’s second wife dreams of being the only one. Resigned to a plural marriage, she dedicates herself to being the perfect wife. When she stumbles across information about one of her husband’s other wives she becomes obsessed with finding her. But what she finds is a much darker truth than she expected. And as secrets and lies unravel, Thursday must make a choice between what she so desperately wants or what’s right. THE WIVES by New York Times bestselling author Tarryn Fisher is a suspenseful and complex novel that explores the dark side of polygamy.

Katie Russo is an ambitious twenty-nine-year-old television news producer, skilled at exposing celebrity scandals and scoring exclusive interviews but baffled by her new role: stepmom to two challenging adolescent girls. Her newlywed bliss is complicated by her husband’s vindictive ex-wife, who thwarts Katie’s best efforts at every turn. Katie forms an unexpected alliance with two other young stepmothers: Leslie Kezerian, an artist struggling with her fledgling career and overbearing in-laws, and Sophia Rivera, a single mom and middle school teacher who feels like she’s competing with the memory of her boyfriend’s dead wife. When Katie creates an anonymous blog about stepmothering it becomes a bonding space for the three—a place where they share escalating frustrations about crazy ex-wives, bratty stepchildren, and unsupportive husbands. But their lives take unexpected turns when Katie’s new boss undermines her career, Leslie is pitted against her stepdaughter for her husband’s loyalty, and Sophia’s hope of becoming a family is threatened by her stepson’s rebellion and her boyfriend’s determination to preserve his wife’s memory. The blog goes viral, and under threat of being exposed, all three women must face their own mistakes and decide what’s most important. THE LEAGUE OF WICKED STEPMOTHERS by debut author and award-winning blogger Kelly Seal is an entertaining and compelling look at the complicated relationships and unique challenges women face when they step into a ready-made family. In the spirit of Emily Giffin’s The One & Only and inspired by the author’s Huffington Post article that went viral, this debut will stir emotions and spark conversation about personal identity and belonging in a modern family.

Handsome and decorated Hartford paramedic Sam Henry, responding to a 911 call, finds his half-brother, a United States congressman, dead in a hotel room with a syringe at bedside and an empty heroin bag labeled “Dead Man.” Their father, a four-term United States senator, pressures Sam to run for his brother’s vacant congressional seat against family rival Ben Goldman, a former classmate of Sam’s, who has made his reputation as an unrelenting tough-on-crime district attorney. But first, Sam needs to find out who is responsible for what he believes is his brother’s murder and unravel the tangled political webs of deceit and ambition behind the lives of those closest to him. Caught between the 911 world of emergency response which he loves and the political world he is told is his birthright, Sam must also choose between stunning TV reporter (an old flame) Audrey Vanderbilt, and Jennifer Diaz, a fellow EMT and mother of a ten-year-old, to whom Sam has been a father figure.  Set against the backdrop of the opioid epidemic, the novel races through the worlds of emergency medical response, street-corner heroin dealing, drug treatment clinics, law enforcement, political consulting, the pharmaceutical industry and the US Congress as Sam pursues the truth to its explosive conclusion. DEAD MAN is written with undeniable authenticity by former US Senate aide and speechwriter, Peter Canning, who for the last twenty years has been a full-time paramedic on the streets of Hartford, battling heroin overdoses and gun violence.

Grieving her sister’s death, Winter Fitzgerald finds a cryptic note in her handwriting that suggests the cancer June battled for two years isn’t what claimed her life—and points to June’s husband Mitch as the guilty one. Winter is stuck in a stale relationship and a stagnant job, with a reputation in her small Minnesota hometown for being a screw-up. But, convinced June was murdered, Winter launches into a search for the truth, determined to do this one thing right. As corroborating evidence emerges, a big-city detective takes over the case, resenting Winter’s interference, and even Winter’s parents seem skeptical. Only June’s best friend, Karen, takes Winter seriously, reminding Winter of the inner strength June always knew she had. But the closer they get to answers, the more risky the search becomes. Winter doesn’t know whom she can trust—or if she can even trust herself to find the truth instead of destroying everything in her path. WITHOUT JUNE by Elissa Dickey is an unexpected, twisty debut with a sense of quiet menace that grows until the stunning revelation on the final pages. (Please note, this project is represented by Sharon Pelletier.)

Franny Stone has spent her life beside the sea, in the sea, on the sea, obsessed with the birds that soar above it – preferring the wildness of the currents and the waves to anything humans have to offer. After losing her funding for a study of the Arctic tern’s migration—one of the last, now that nearly all animal life on our planet is extinct—Franny talks her way onto a fishing vessel for one final journey, following the delicate, yet hardy bird to the end of its route. As the ship fights its way south through the often rough, always lonely sea, the story of Franny’s life unspools – a missing mother, a sudden marriage, a dark crime, an unspeakable loss. When the ship’s migration turns ugly, fragmenting the crew, Franny fears the wildness within her has once again tainted something good, and the thing she’s been running from—yet searching for—all her life finally catches up with her. MIGRATIONS by Charlotte McConaghy is a searing, audacious, heartrending novel for fans of Lauren Groff and Claire Vaye Watkins. McConaghy is a television writer whose SFF has been published in the UK and Australia; with MIGRATIONS she embarks on a new category for her US debut. (Please note, this project is represented by Sharon Pelletier.)

Like every other actress in Chicago, Kira Rascher is well-aware of the rumors about Malcolm Mercer, but she can’t turn down the career-making chance to star in his esteemed theater company’s next premiere. As rehearsals get underway, she realizes he’s mercurial, merciless—and the most thrilling scene partner she’s ever shared a stage with. There’s no mind game he won’t play to provoke the performance he wants, and whenever Kira thinks she’s winning, he changes the rules. Joanna Cuyler, the theater’s co-founder, sees Kira as a threat to her twisted relationship with Mal, not to mention the company she’s given her life to. Joanna knows better than anyone what Malcolm is willing to do—and she’s keeping a secret about the upcoming play that could change everything. As opening night draws near, Kira sinks further into the dark mind of her character, while Joanna’s resentment pushes her towards an irreversible decision. In the context of a conscienceless man, staged violence begins to draw real blood; Kira and Joanna start to realize that what they should fear most isn’t what Mal might do, but how far they might go in response. Layne Fargo’s debut TEMPER is the angry, daring, sexy, heart-in-your-throat feminist thriller you’ve been waiting for. (Please note, this project is represented by Sharon Pelletier.)

Ever since her husband’s violent death, single mom Cassandra Reynolds has worked to rebuild her life.  Perhaps that is what brought her back to her hometown of Lost Beach—a tourist town along the Mississippi Gulf Coast that has reimagined itself in the wake of Katrina.  But this attempt to create a “normal” life for herself and her young son end when Cassie discovers a dead body washed up on the beach.  There’s something about the victim’s identity and how the killer has artfully posed the body in death that make Cassie obsessed with the case.   A chance encounter with an old high school crush, who just happens to be the town’s sheriff, gives Cassie access to the crime investigation.  And, when another woman is found murdered, Cassie must navigate the town’s maze of gossip-mongering Southern women and a voodoo priestess, who knows the residents’ dirty secrets, to find the answers the local police force seems unable—and unwilling—to uncover for fear of destroying the community’s picture-perfect image.  Having attracted the attention of the serial killer, who senses a kindred spirit, Cassie is now caught up in a deadly race to save herself and her child.  A dark psychological thriller, LOST BEACH by Lisa Kröger marks a fascinating debut. (Please note this project is represented by Ann Leslie Tuttle.)

PORTRAIT OF LISE by Christine Adler is the astonishing real-life story of Lise Tréhot, secret lover and model for 19th-century Impressionist painter Pierre-Auguste Renoir.  Set against the lush backdrop of Paris’s transformation into a grand city, PORTRAIT OF LISE imagines for the first time the relationship between the artist and his model.  Choosing a different life than her sister, who sought a proper and prosperous marriage, seventeen-year-old Lise succumbed to a request to pose for yet unknown painter Pierre-Auguste Renoir after her father’s business collapsed.  Soon, she is in Renoir’s bed and in his heart, and their passion turns to love.   As the City of Lights hovers on the brink of bloody conflict, Adler’s fictionalized tale is one of ambition, heartache and reinvention.  Readers who loved THE PARIS WIFE will embrace this poignant account that is every bit as colorful as Renoir’s early masterpieces.  (Please note, this project is represented by Ann Leslie Tuttle.)

Fleeing a scandal that threatens her career and reputation, Julia Saint Hilaire accepts a teaching job in the remote town of Fort Parry, Manitoba.  But an eerie sighting of Holly Robin—local bad girl, missing for six months and presumed dead—leaves Julia wondering if, like herself, this town has secrets it wants buried.  Mystified by a string of bizarre encounters with the missing teen, Julia digs into Holly’s disappearance and meets surprising resistance from the townspeople.  Her only confidant proves to be a handsome bush pilot and shameless flirt, who awakens her interest, but seems to somehow be tied to Holly’s last days.  To further complicate matters, Julia uncovers evidence that Holly was dabbling in blood magic that, according to local legend, might have resurrected a land spirit from Inuit lore.   If Julia hopes to end the unexplained sightings and reclaim her life, she must expose what really happened on the winter’s night when the teen vanished—even if it means possibly becoming a target for murder.  Inspired by Inuit lore, THE MADDENING OF HOLLY ROBIN by Carolyne Topdjian marks a fantastic suspense debut. (Please note, this project is represented by Ann Leslie Tuttle.)

Leigh Bracho's life is collapsing all around her. A fire in her building renders her apartment nearly inhospitable. The intervention she planned for her mother’s deteriorating mental condition fails fantastically. And she receives an unwanted promotion at what was supposed to have been a temporary job at the posh SoHo eatery where she tends bar. Sure, in another universe the latter might have been considered good fortune, but Leigh doesn’t know what she wants out of life. And in this universe, it means Leigh must contend with the new hire Croix, an off-the-books artisanal ice carver. She finds his erratic behavior unsettling, but none of her colleagues seem too concerned that Croix’s past seems to change with each retelling. At first, Leigh intends to get him fired. She can ignore Croix’s disturbing ice sculptures and passive aggressive manipulations until she is able to expose him as a fraud. But then a couple of odd “workplace accidents” occur and Leigh’s best friend Bernard disappears tailing Croix home one night at her request, causing Leigh to fear that ice is not all Croix is carving with his tools. Sean Gill’s debut MELT IT DOWN is a relentless, paranoid psychological thriller populated with offbeat characters, swirling conspiracies, and eccentric New York locales. Gill is the winner of The Cincinnati Review's 2017 Robert and Adele Schiff Award in Prose, the 2017 River Styx Microfiction Contest, and the 2016 Sonora Review Fiction Prize. His short fiction has been published in The Iowa Review, McSweeney's, Carolina Quarterly, Akashic Books, and elsewhere. (Please note, Mike Hoogland is the agent on this project.)

Lane and Jory Fieldman are throwbacks from a time when men's bones were long and clean, before the ocean currents stilled and the air turned to poison. Sons of a settlement boss, sheltered from the harsh realities of the end of days, they live a life easier than most—until tragedy strikes and forces them to assume responsibility for a broken and desperate people. Lane, struggling to live up to expectations and haunted by loss, becomes settlement governor. On a supply run he is forced to make a hard decision that results in the loss of his arm, his title, and Kara, the girl he has known and loved since boyhood. With Lane now a shell of the man he once was, Jory must step in when salvation appears from an unexpected and mysterious source. If Jory marries Kara and agrees to work for these otherworldly visitors—vetting candidates for relocation to another planet—he and Kara will be granted passage off a dying Earth and have a shot at a future they stopped believing was possible. Only, it would mean leaving Lane behind. A post-apocalyptic novel in which the science fictional elements function as a backdrop to poignant family drama, Katherine Salter’s THE ENDING FIELDS is a story of survival, sacrifice, redemption, and discovering what’s worth fighting for when there is nothing left to lose. (Please note, Mike Hoogland is the agent on this project.)

When academic librarian Graham Evans inherits his father’s prize fly-fishing rod, his brother convinces him the least he can do is to try the sport he abandoned as a teenager. But instead of getting Xan-the-Mountain-Man fishing guide his brother recommends, he ends up with Sam(antha) Halvorsen. The mix-up lands them on the wrong foot initially; Sam, dealing with near-constant sexism in her various jobs, immediately assumes the worst about him. But as the two get to know each other, friendship and attraction bloom between them. Graham develops a deep respect for Sam’s integrity and her sense of self, while Sam yearns for the kind of security and stability Graham has created in his own life. They have the tentative beginnings of a relationship when a letter arrives from Norway, revealing that Sam has inherited a farm there from a great uncle. For broke Sam, this could be a boon—until she realized that the documents say that she is another man’s granddaughter, shattering her comfortable ideas about her identity and heritage, and sending her into a tailspin. With Graham’s help, Sam must discover who she really is at her core and what choices she will make with her own life. With a fresh and candid voice and sharp humor, debut author Adele Buck spins SLOW DRIFT, a delightfully contemporary tale about the importance of family, a woman making her own way in a man’s world—and the man who wants to be a part of her adventure. (Please note, this project is represented by Amy Elizabeth Bishop.)

Rights Round Up

Audible acquired audio rights to BREAKING HOLLYWOOD and UNDER HER by Samantha Towle, UNINTENDED, REDEMPTION, DEAR AGONY, and ENDURANCE by Georgia Cates, HATE CRIME by Joyce King, LIVING OUT LOUD by Nyrae Dawn and Christina Lee, and TEMPTING LOVE by Kelly Elliott. Audio rights to HIDEAWAY by Penelope Douglas, BANEWREAKER and GODSLAYER by Jacqueline Carey, A QUESTION OF FREEDOM by R. Dwayne Betts, and HOUSE OF VERSACE by Deborah Ball went to Tantor. Brilliance has rights to PLAY ON by Samantha Young. Listening Library acquired audio rights to WELCOME TO WONDERLAND #4 and SEVEN STEPS TO SUCCESS by Chris Grabenstein. Blackstone will publish Tom Henderson’s AFRAID OF THE DARK, BLOOD IN THE SNOW, BLOOD JUSTICE, and A DEADLY AFFAIR.

Film rights to NIGHT CHILD by Jes Battis were optioned by Entpro, Inc. IN THE PATH OF FALLING OBJECTS by Andrew Smith was optioned by Chemical Soup, LLC. These Pictures LLC optioned film rights to IRENA’S CHILDREN by Tilar Mazzeo. Film rights to BROTHERHOOD OF THE ROSE by David Morrell were optioned by NBC/Universal. RISE by Cara Brookins was optioned by Escape Artists, with David Bloomfield producing.

Record acquired Portuguese rights to THE WAKING by James Dashner, Sperling acquired Italian rights, Q acquired Dutch rights, Michael Joseph/PRH acquired UK rights, Euromedia acquired Czech rights, and Litera acquired Romanian rights, while Kadokawa acquired Japanese rights for THE DEATH CURE. Egmont acquired Bulgarian rights to Gayle Forman’s I HAVE LOST MY WAY, while Sextante acquired Portuguese rights, Gyldendal acquired Danish rights, Hachette Livres acquired French rights, Mondadori acquired Italian rights, Moon acquired Dutch rights, Proszynski acquired Polish rights, and S&S acquired UK rights. Hungarian rights to Mariana Zapata’s DEAR AARON were sold to Konyvmolykepzo, Turkish rights for KULTI went to Albatros, French rights for WAIT FOR IT went to J’ai Lu, and Italian rights for THE WALL OF WINNIPEG AND ME went to Newton Compton. Abbi Glines’s THE VINCENT BOYS and THE VINCENT BROTHERS were sold for Polish publication to Kobiece/Illuminatio, ONCE SHE DREAMED #1 and #2, LIKE A MEMORY, and BECAUSE OF LILA were sold for German publication to Piper, and JUST FOR NOW, SOMETIMES IT LASTS, and LIKE A MEMORY were sold for Dutch publication to Karakter. Samantha Young’s INTO THE DEEP and OUT OF THE SHADOWS will be published in Portuguese by Astral, PLAY ON will be published in German by Ullstein and in Polish by Burda, and THE IMPOSSIBLE VASTNESS OF US will be published in Turkish by Dogan. Niezwykle acquired Polish rights to Georgia Cates’s BEAUTY series, and Adel Publishing acquired Hebrew rights to A NECESSARY SIN and THE NEXT SIN. Polish rights for REVVED and REVIVED by Samantha Towle were acquired by Niezwykle, and Newton Compton acquired Italian rights for THE STORM. The ROOMMATES series and SEXY STRANGER by Kendall Ryan will be published in Croatia by 24 SATA and in Italy by Newton Compton. Mohammed Hasan Alwan’s A SMALL DEATH will be published in Italy by Edizioni E/O and UK rights to Yousef Bashir’s THE WORDS OF MY FATHER went to Haus UK. Traditional Chinese rights to RISE by Cara Brookins were sold to Brandon Cultural and Creative Co.  CHOKED by Beth Gardiner sold for Korean publication to Bookhouse Publishers Co. Garzanti acquired Italian rights to LAST WOMAN STANDING by Amy Gentry. GLUTEN-FREE ARTISAN BREAD IN FIVE MINUTES A DAY by Jeff Hertzberg and Zoë François will be published in German by Narayana Verlag. Elizabeth Hunter’s THE GENIUS AND THE MUSE was sold for Italian publication to Hope Edizioni. BEST TIMES EVER by Mark Juddery went to PWN for Polish publication. Indonesian rights for THE MUSEUM OF HEARTBREAK by Meg Leder went to PT Elex Media. Tilar Mazzeo’s IRENA’S CHILDREN was sold for Japanese publication to Tokyo Sogensha. Books in Batumi acquired Georgian rights to Richelle Mead’s VAMPIRE ACADEMY, FROSTBITE, and SHADOW KISS. Cappelen Damm acquired Norwegian rights to Heather Moore (ed.)’s SUMMER IN NEW YORK COLLECTION and SUMMER WEDDING COLLECTION. Amy Morin’s 13 THINGS MENTALLY STRONG PEOPLE DON’T DO was sold for Vietnamese publication to Saigon Books and for Telugu rights to Manjul Publishing House. Vulkan acquired Serbian rights to THE ASTONISHING COLOR OF AFTER by Emily X.R. Pan, and Universo dos Livros acquired Portuguese rights. The IN THE COMPANY OF KILLERS SERIES by Jessica Redmerski will be published in Polish by Niezwykle.  German rights for SEDUCED IN THE DARK and EPILOGUE by CJ Roberts went to Festa. Larry Rosen and Adam Gazzaley’s THE DISTRACTED MIND was sold for Italian publication to Franco Angeli. UNDESERVING by Madeline Sheehan sold for German publication to Sieben. Ciela Norma acquired Bulgarian rights to GRASSHOPPER JUNGLE by Andrew Smith. UK rights for THE SUNKEN GOLD by Joseph A. Williams went to The History Press.

RECENT SALES

KEEP IT NUANCED: THE PANTSUIT POLITICS GUIDE TO GRACE-FILLED POLITICAL CONVERSATIONS by Sarah Stewart Holland and Beth Silvers went to Nelson Books in a World rights deal by Sharon Pelletier.

Valerie Trueblood’s TERRARIUM: NEW AND SELECTED STORIES went to Counterpoint Press in a World English rights deal by Jessica Papin.

North American rights to HOW TO BE LESS STUPID ABOUT RACE by Crystal Marie Fleming were sold to Beacon Press in a deal by Michael Bourret.

Lauren Abramo sold World English rights for BEST. CEREMONY. EVER. by Christopher Shelley to Countryman Press/W.W. Norton.

ALL THE THINGS WE DO IN THE DARK by Saundra Mitchell went to HarperTeen in a World rights deal by Jim McCarthy.

CRC Press/Taylor and Francis bought World English rights to THE SHERLOCK EFFECT by Thomas Young, MD in a deal by Jessica Papin.

World rights to Sarah Schulman’s MAGGIE TERRY were sold to Feminist Press in a deal by Michael Bourret.

Katherine Locke and Laura Silverman’s IT’S A WHOLE SPIEL went to Knopf Books for Young Readers in a World rights deal by Jim McCarthy.

Sharon Pelletier sold WESTSIDE: A GILDA CARR MYSTERY and a second book in the series by W.M. Akers to Harper Voyager in a World English rights deal.

World rights to Laura Sook Duncombe’s A PIRATE LIFE FOR SHE were sold to Chicago Review Press in a deal by John Rudolph.

TIDEWATER DWELLER BOOKS 1-3 by Debbie Herbert were sold to Harlequin in a World rights deal by Ann Leslie Tuttle.

World rights to TWO DAYS IN KENTUCKY by Matthew Algeo were sold to Chicago Review Press.

DON’T CALL ME A F*** YOGI by Jessamyn Stanley was sold to Workman in a World rights deal.

Caylin Louis Moore’s DREAMS TOO BIG went to Nelson Books in a World rights deal.

World rights to STREET VEHICLES and FARM ANIMALS by Steve and Chieri DeGregorio sold to Penguin Studio in a deal by Jim McCarthy.

Stacey Glick sold World rights to HALF BAKED HARVEST QUICK AND HEALTHY…ISH by Tieghan Gerard to Clarkson Potter.

THE GIRL HE USED TO KNOW by Tracey Garvis-Graves went to St. Martin’s Press in a World rights deal.

Shauna James Ahern’s ENOUGH was sold to Sasquatch Books in a World rights deal by Stacey Glick.

World rights to KINGS, QUEENS & IN-BETWEENS by Tanya Boteju went to Simon Pulse in a deal by Jim McCarthy.

Jessica Papin sold North American rights to EVERY LITTLE THING’S GONNA HAPPEN by Chavi Eve Karkowsky, MD to Liveright/Norton.

AGE OF INCANDESCENCE and UNTITLED BOOK 2 by Diana Biller went to St. Martin’s Press in a World rights deal by Amy Elizabeth Bishop.

Abbi Glines’s FIELD PARTY BOOKS 6 & 7 were sold to Simon Pulse for World rights.

World English rights to MY YEAR OF ABSTINENCE by Jacqueline Raposo were sold to Ixia Press/Dover in a deal by Stacey Glick.

Stacey Glick sold World rights to Joyce Scott with Brie Spangler’s UNTITLED JUDITH SCOTT PICTURE BOOK to Knopf Books for Young Readers.

PERSEPHONE’S SISTER by Megan Collins was sold to Touchstone in a World rights deal by Sharon Pelletier.

Saundra Mitchell and Josh Berk’s CAMP MURDERFACE and BOOK 2 were sold to Harper Children’s in a World rights deal by Jim McCarthy.

THE WAKING by James Dashner went to Ballantine Bantam Dell in a North American rights deal by Michael Bourret.

Da Capo Press bought World rights to WHOLE IN ONE by Ellie Krieger.

World rights to MAYAN TRANSCENDENCE by Gabriela Jurosz-Landa went to Inner Traditions in a deal by John Rudolph.

UNTITLED ON JOHN MARSHALL by Robert Strauss went to Lyons Press in a World rights deal.

Stacey Glick sold World rights to Barbara Schieving and Marci Buttars’s INSTANTLY SWEET to Harvard Common Press/Quarto.

Tehlor Mejia and Anna-Marie McLemore’s METEOR was sold to Harper Teen in a North American rights deal by Jim McCarthy.

THE FAR SEA by Sarah Menkedick was sold to Pantheon in a World English rights deal.