And Other Stories scoops second Luke Brown novel

And Other Stories has scooped the second “exhilarating howl of a novel” from acclaimed writer and editor Luke Brown.

Publisher Stefan Tobler bought world English rights for Theft from Peter Straus at Rogers, Coleridge and White. It will be released as the indie’s lead fiction title for spring 2020.

Tobler said: “Theft is an exhilarating howl of a novel about love, envy and revenge which gives us a new perspective on the current state of Britain: class, privilege, and identity politics through the lens of a man from a broken town in the north-west now living a precarious life in London. It’s a book that had me laughing out loud and quoting bits to people, and a book that kept me thinking long after each read. It connects the current fates of the north and the south in a way I haven’t seen in recent British fiction, and it couldn’t be more timely.”

Brown’s debut novel, My Biggest Lie (Canongate), was published in 2014, described by Gary Shteyngart as “a real page-turner” and “a ludic, drunk, dizzying jaunt” by Dazed & Confused.

His new book moves between gentrified east London and Fleetwood, Lancashire, where Brown grew up. He said: “For better or worse my character was formed by growing up in a northern seaside town and working in independent publishing for more than a decade. So it’s a lovely homecoming to be published by an independent based in the north which has such international great taste, artistic ambition and publishing nous.”