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Funke moves to Pushkin Press after 'editorial disagreement'
After parting ways with Chicken House, author Cornelia Funke has signed a deal to publish the Reckless series with Pushkin Press in the UK.
Last year Funke stopped Chicken House and her US publisher, Little, Brown, from publishing the third book in the series, then called Mirrorworld, after an editorial disagreement.
Chicken House m.d. Barry Cunningham told The Bookseller at the time: “We had some editorial thoughts about the direction of the last book that she didn’t agree with. One of the purposes of a publisher is to edit so if we felt there was a better book to be made and she didn’t then we have reached the best conclusion.
Adam Freudenheim, publisher and m.d. of Pushkin Press, said he contacted Funke directly after she decided not to continue with her former publishers.
“I spotted an opportunity,” he said. “Cornelia is best known in the UK for her middle-grade titles but these books have older protagonists so will have more teen and YA, even crossover, appeal. We’ve got the opportunity to re-present the books to the widest possible audience.”
Pushkin, which now has the UK and Commonwealth rights to the series, will republish the first two installments in the series, Reckless I: The Petrified Flesh and Reckless ll: Living Shadows, in paperback in September (r.r.p. £7.99). The first book will be published in a revised form, and both books will appear for the first time with the title they had in their original German editions and with new covers.
Pushkin will then publish the third volume, Reckless III: The Golden Yarn, in November for the first time in hardback (£12.99).
Funke said in a statement: “Had I been asked to write the most perfect UK publishing home for my Reckless series the result would probably be a mirror image of Pushkin Press. As a writer and reader I have been admiring the exquisite list of authors and as an illustrator their beautiful book design. So when Adam Freudenheim contacted me it felt as if I had been invited to an enchanted house I had admired from afar. I can’t wait to see my books on its shelves.”
