Deals

Audio rights – Author of BECOMING MRS. LEWIS Patti Callahan‘s WILD SWAN, a novella following the fiery young Florence Nightingale as she bravely bursts through the conventions of early 18th-century England and familial Victorian values to travel the world and become the legendary nurse and The Lady With the Lamp, to Lara Blackman at Audible Originals, in a nice deal, in an exclusive submission, by Marly Rusoff at Marly Rusoff and Associates (world).

Discrimination attorney specializing in women’s rights and family issues Toni Halleen‘s untitled novel, about an impoverished twenty-year-old who plans to earn college money by becoming a surrogate mother for a lawyer with two grown sons and his wife, but two days after giving birth, she escapes from the hospital into the snowy woods of Northern Minnesota, taking the newborn with her, forcing the wife to shift into investigative mode in a way that risks destroying her marriage, to Sara Nelson at Harper, in a good deal, in a pre-empt, in a two-book deal, by Marly Rusoff at Marly Rusoff & Associates (world).

Frequent contributor to NYT from Europe Nina Siegal’s THE DIARY KEEPERS, based on select writings from a Dutch collection of 2,000 World War II diaries written by ordinary citizens and maintained by devoted archivists, shedding light on how a largely peace loving people experienced the war, including five or six first-person narratives told from various perspectives, from a Nazi-sympathizer to a Jewish journalist who documented daily activities at a transport camp, to Denise Oswald at Ecco, in a significant deal, in a pre-empt, by Marly Rusoff at Marly Rusoff & Associates (world).

Dianna Rostad’s YOU BELONG HERE NOW, set in 1925 Yellowstone County Montana where a brusque spinster rancher begrudgingly takes in three mysterious orphans and after an alarming discovery about the oldest she must face a decision that challenges her deepest held beliefs in a big-hearted story of redemption and forgiveness where even wild horses find their place, to Lucia Macro at William Morrow, in a very nice deal, at auction, by Marly Rusoff at Marly Rusoff & Associates (world English).

Nonfiction – Narrative – Untitled – Kerry Egan’s author of On Living, now offers original and unexpected observations on vocation, a chaplain and mother’s view of the most meaningful work of all, the task of forging a sense of a life well lived, sold to Riverhead’s Rebecca Saletan by agent Marly Rusoff, in a good deal, NA and audio.

Daniel Ehrenhaft at Soho Teen has bought Mercury Boys by Chandra Prasad. Pitched as a little bit Heathers, a little bit Miss Peregrine, the YA thriller follows a secret society of girls who discover that when they handle liquid mercury, they are able to visit long-dead people who appear in daguerreotypes. Publication is planned for spring 2021; Marly Rusoff at the Rusoff Agency negotiated the deal for world English rights.

Homeira Qaderi’s DANCING IN THE MOSQUE a memoir of growing up in Afghanistan and becoming a writer and social and women’s rights activist and one of the young teachers featured in Christina Lamb’s bestseller The Sewing Circles of Herat that offers a moving personal account of her life as a young woman coming of age in war torn Afghanistan, and as a young wife and mother written in the form of a letter to the infant son taken away from her, to to Sara Nelson of Harper Collins in a six figure deal by agent Marly Rusoff at Marly Rusoff & Associates. (World English and audio)

Fiction – General Other – Meg Waite Clayton’s The Last Train to London—pitched as a novel for readers of The Nightingale and All the Light We Cannot See, and based on a true story from the years just before WWII began—celebrates the efforts of a childless Dutchwoman who, against all odds, faces down Adolf Eichmann to rescue thousands of children from Nazi-occupied Vienna, including a young aspiring playwright and gifted daughter of an anti-Nazi journalist. To Harper Collin’s Sara Nelson at auction in a major two-book deal by agent Marly Rusoff, for publication in November 2019 (World plus audio)

Fiction – General Other – Jon Clinch author of FINN winner of Athenaeum Literary Award and best book of the year by the Washington Post, the Chicago Tribune, and the Christian Science Monitor imagines in MARLEY the secret-filled life of Charles Dickens’s Jacob Marley, longtime business partner of Ebenezer Scrooge, revealing how decades of personal and professional hostilities turned Scrooge into the man we encounter at the start of A Christmas Carol, to Peter Borland at Atria, in a pre-empt, in a good deal by Marly Rusoff at Marly Rusoff & Associates. (World)

Nonfiction/Memoir – Author of the novels The Same Sweet Girls and The Sunday Wife Cassandra King Conroy’s TELL ME A STORY: A NOT-SO LITERARY ROMANCE, a memoir and midlife love story of two cautious, disillusioned romantics who forged a life together in their beloved Lowcountry despite the demands of dual writing careers, dysfunctional families, and through illness, and ultimately, through the death of her husband Pat Conroy, to Carrie Feron at William Morrow, by Marly Rusoff at Marly Rusoff & Associates (world English).