Christmas humour title and Solo cookbook to HQ

HQ has made two non-fiction acquisitions: Have Yourself a Very British Christmas, a "laugh-out-loud" guide to the great British Christmas by journalist Rhodri Marsden and Solo Food, a cookbook from one of the Netherlands’ "best-loved" culinary journalists and home cooks, Janneke Vreugdenhil.

Senior commissioning editor, Rachel Kenny, acquired UK and Commonwealth rights to Solo Food from Cathryn Summerhayes at Curtis Brown.

Vreugdenhil suddenly found herself living alone for part of the week after the unexpected break up of her marriage. Determined not to let her home dining standards slip, she set out to create and cook meals that were not too time-consuming to put together and were also delicious to eat. Her collection of recipes became Solo Food.

Vreugdenhil said: “I’m incredibly excited to become part of this wonderful new imprint of HarperCollins. Now that solo seems to be the new togetherness, I feel it’s high time to finally take the single cook a bit more seriously. Whether you’re alone by choice or by chance, whether you eat alone every night or just now and then, I hope this book will help you discover that cooking for yourself can be very satisfying. Perhaps precisely because it’s just you. You’re essentially your own ideal guest – you know exactly what this person likes to eat.”

Solo Food will be published in trade paperback and e-book on the 8th Feburary 2018.

Kenny also acquired world all language rights to Have Yourself a Very British Christmas: Twelve Days of Discomfort and Joy, a gift-humour book from London-based writer, musician and former Independent columnist, Rhodri Marsden.

Kenny acquired the rights from Tim Bates at PFD.

Have Yourself a Very British Christmas is the “essential stocking filler for every Brit who’s ever found themselves on a deflating air bed in their parents’ spare room wedged up against the washing machine come Christmas Eve, wondering why this Christmas, just like every year, doesn’t look like the ones on telly”.

Marsden said: "I've always loved to write about people behaving in an unusual fashion, and Christmas gives everyone a free pass to do just that. There is no British Christmas etiquette. If you want to become drunkenly disorientated and pull a bookcase down on yourself at 3am while trying to get out of a darkened room, you can. No one minds. It's fine. Last week I re-read Dickens' A Christmas Carol; it's a wonderful book, beautifully written, but there's nothing in it about a Party King Prawn Ring (300g), Slade, or the Vicar of Dibley Christmas Special. This is the cultural disparity that I'm now addressing with some urgency."

Kenny said: “Rhodri is the perfect person to write a begrudging celebration of the essential elements that make up the Great British Christmas and we’re thrilled about this fantastic addition to our non-fiction Christmas outing particularly when hardback gift-humour continues to be such a thriving area of the market.”

Have Yourself a Very British Christmas will be published in hardback and e-book on the 2nd November 2017.