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Blackman, de Waal and Nesbø write for 2024 Quick Reads with new funding from PRH and Hachette
The Reading Agency has announced the full return of the Quick Reads project, featuring Malorie Blackman and Jo Nesbø, along with a new funding commitment from Penguin Random House UK and Hachette following author Jojo Moyes’ scheme-saving support.
The 2024 titles will also feature Kit de Waal, Kia Abdullah, Karen Swan and Matt Cain, scheduled for publication on 11th April 2024 as part of the renewed long-running literacy scheme.
Hachette and PRH UK will fund Quick Reads titles publishing for 2024, the Reading Agency has announced. Last year the charity adopted a new delivery framework during a funding changeover and the scheme featured a selection of specially reprinted titles from the series’ 17-year history. Funding details beyond 2024 will soon be confirmed.
Moyes had supported Quick Reads for three years until 2022, through a philanthropic gift, saving the scheme from planned closure in 2019. She contributed the annual running costs of around £120,000 after learning about an 18-month funding struggle, in a report in The Bookseller. The project had been funded by Galaxy between 2010 and 2016, and then contributing publishers supported it for two years along with private donations, but it required long-term sponsorship to continue.
Now the Reading Agency has tipped the newly revealed books for 2024 as “reflecting the very best contemporary writing” featuring both original and specially abridged titles, with two apiece from PRH UK and Hachette as well one each from Pan Macmillan and HarperCollins.
“A suspenseful, court room page turner” will feature by thriller author Abdullah (pictured below; Those People Next Door, HQ) along with “a hard-hitting emotional tale of teenage fatherhood” from multi-award-winning Blackman (Boys Don’t Cry, Penguin Random House Children’s).
There is “a joyful and surprising tale about love, friendship and football” from broadcaster and LGBTQ+ advocate Cain (Game On, Headline), de Waal’s “vibrant and unforgettable memoir of how books saved her life" in Without Warning and Only Sometimes (Headline), as well as “a dangerously dark thriller” from Nesbø (The Jealousy Man, Vintage) and an “epic, spellbinding historical romance set against the backdrop of untamed beauty of St Kilda in 1930s high society” from Swan (The Last Summer, Pan Macmillan).
The Reading Agency said: “Quick Reads plays a vital role in addressing the UK’s adult literacy crisis, engaging the one in three adults who do not regularly read for pleasure and the one in six adults who find reading difficult. Since the programme launched in 2006, over 5.3 million Quick Reads have been distributed with over 6.14 million registered library loans.”
The titles are available for just £1 at bookshops and are free to borrow from libraries. They are used across the country in colleges, prisons, trade unions, hospitals and adult learning organisations. The six titles announced today will also be gifted as part of World Book Night 2024. Copies of the books will be given away to organisations including care homes, youth centres, homelessness centres, prisons, hospitals and other companies through public library partners.
Karen Napier, c.e.o. of the Reading Agency, said: "We are excited as we unveil the remarkable line-up of authors collaborating with Quick Reads to publish a bitesize book for 2024 – and we thank them and all the publishers for their support to this life-changing programme."
She also paid tribute to Moyes: “We would also like to extend heartfelt gratitude to Jojo Moyes for the generous donation from 2020 to 2022 which helped to shape the future of the initiative. This year we are supported by Penguin Random House and Hachette who have contributed funding to the programme. We will be celebrating Quick Reads as part of World Book Night 2024 in our continued mission to bring high-quality, fun and accessible books to a wider audience to discover the transformative power of reading.”
