Daunt Books Publishing to launch new Originals list for 10th anniversary

Daunt Books Publishing is launching a new Originals list for literary fiction and narrative non-fiction in 2020—the year of its 10th anniversary.

Launch titles for Daunt Books Originals include debut novels Winter in Sokcho by Elisa Shua Dusapin (translated by Aneesa Abbas Higgins), Indelicacy by Amina Cain, Empty Houses by Brenda Navarro (translated by Sophie Hughes), and short-story collection The Dominant Animal by Kathryn Scanlan.

Each will be published as paperback originals with French flaps and priced £9.99.

Publisher Željka Marošević explained: “The Originals list can best be described by the writing of the first authors we’ll publish: boldly original and formally daring. From Scanlan’s terrifyingly brilliant short stories and Navarro’s searing exploration of ambivalent motherhood, to Cain’s ghostly novel about class and artmaking and Dusapin’s exquisitely crafted debut set over one Korean winter, these are innovative and unexpected books that speak to each other across borders and languages.

“It was important to us not to distinguish between English-language books and books in translation – they’re all exceptional books we’re proud to publish. I’m excited to launch this list at the start of Daunt Books Publishing’s 10th anniversary year as we celebrate all the books we’ve published thus far and look to the future.”

Marošević and Sophie Missing will commission new titles for the Originals. Becca Calf, currently publishing assistant at Daunt Books Publishing, will take on a new role as editorial assistant.

Daunt Books Publishing grew out of the book chain and was established in 2010. It originally published out-of-print classics before expanding to also publish contemporary writers. Recent successes have included the Pulitzer Prize nominated novel In the Distance by Hernan Diaz, the republication of Natalia Ginzburg's work, and At the Pond, a collection of original essays about swimming at the Hampstead Ladies’ Pond.