Curtis Brown staffer's debut, second Villanelle novel on Frankfurt hotlists

A debut from a literary assistant at Curtis Brown acquired in the UK in a "major" auction, and a dark thriller pre-empted for a substantial six figures, are among agents' coveted hotlist picks going into 2018's Frankfurt Book Fair. Alongside them are fresh offerings from Jessie Burton, Luke Jennings, and Libby Page, as well as an "audacious" new novel from Ian McEwan.

The Silent Treatment, a "deeply moving" story about a couple who have been married for 40 years and haven’t spoken to one another for six months, is the debut of Abbie Greaves, who works as a literary assistant to Sheila Crowley at Curtis Brown. UK and Commonwealth rights (excluding Canada) in the book and one other novel were sold to Arrow deputy publisher Emily Griffin following a six-way auction through Maddy Milburn at the Madeleine Milburn Agency. Translation rights have meanwhile sold in Germany (Fischer), Italy (Garzanti), Portugal (Planeta), and Serbia (Vulkan), with Lithuania and Norway under offer, and further deals expected to follow in the lead-up to Frankfurt Book Fair.

Greaves - who submitted the manuscript to agents under the pseudonym Ivy Rafferty the morning after the London Book Fair - was inspired to write The Silent Treatment when she read an article in a newspaper about a boy in Japan who had never seen his parents speak to one another before. It explores universal themes of motherhood and fatherhood, and how love underpins everything, according to Milburn, as well as loneliness, aging, mental health and consent, according to Griffin.

With plans to publish in hardback in February 2020 and in Arrow paperback in June 2020, Griffin commented: "The immediacy and pull of Abbie’s narrative voice drew me instantly into the world of this novel and I couldn’t turn the pages quickly enough. The Silent Treatment introduces a vivid cast of characters whom you root for from the start and, with unflinching honesty, brings to life the euphoric highs and unbearable lows of a marriage stretching four decades ... we can’t wait to put our ambitious publication plans into place."

Meanwhile Sam Lloyd's The Memory Wood, "a dark, emotional and terrifying serial killer cat-and-mouse thriller", has sold to Transworld's Frankie Gray in a substantial six-figure pre-empt for UK rights. Sam Copeland at RCW, who did the deal and is handling further rights sales, told The Bookseller a multi-publisher auction is currently underway in Germany and offers are on the table in Spain and Holland. Slated as a lead title for Transworld in 2020, the book's plot revolves around the abduction of an 11-year-old chess prodigy from a hotel who, waking hours later to find herself tethered to a metal post below ground, must use every shred of her ingenuity to survive. 

Established writers leading the agents' hotlists with fresh offerings include Luke Jennings, Jessie Burton and Libby Page. John Murray publisher Mark Richards lately bought world English rights to No Tomorrow, Jenning's second Villanelle novel, from Patrick Walsh at PEW Literary, to publish in hardback on 25th October. Richards pre-empted rights in the first novel last year just ahead of the London Book Fair; following the psychopathic but glamorous Russian assassin Villanelle and her secret service agent nemesis, it inspired Phoebe Waller-Bridge's rapturously received eight-part BBC drama "Killing Eve", starring Sandra Oh. A second eight-episode season of the drama has already been commissioned. Richards said: "We’re so pleased to be publishing the second in Luke Jennings’ outrageously entertaining series of thrillers, and hope that the deserved critical and ratings success of the TV show will bring even more people to the brilliant source material."

Meanwhile Jessie Burton's next as-yet-untitled novel publishing with Picador is about a famous novelist coming out of retirement after 32 years, while, following on the heels of her feel-good up-lit debut The Lido, Libby Page's second novel The Café That Never Sleeps, publishing with Orion in 2020, tells a story of friendship between two young women, set in a 24-hour cafe in central London. Burton is represented by Juliet Mushens and Page by Robert Caskie, who work alongside one another at Caskie Mushens literary agency.

Booker-winner Ian McEwan's new novel, Machines Like Me (UK and Commonwealth to Cape via RCW's Peter Straus) and Mark Haddon's The Porpoise (UK and Commonwealth rights to Chatto via Clare Alexander) also appear on agents' hotlists, alongside the second novel from Josie Silver, the author of One Day in December, as rights sell in its 25th territory (The Two Lives of Lydia Bird, world rights from Jemima Forrester at David Higham Associates).

There are also new novels from thriller writers S K Tremayne (The Voices, UK and Commonwealth rights to HarperCollins via Eugenie Furniss), Ruth Ware (The Turn of the Key, UK rights to Vintage via Eve White) and Sarah Pinborough (Savannah, UK rights to HarperCollins via Veronique Baxter), and non-fiction from celebrities Mel B (Brutally Honest, world English language rights to Hardie Grant via Charlie Brotherstone) and Ruby Wax (Compassion, UK rights to Penguin Life via Caroline Michel).

According to The Bookseller's Tom Tivnan, agency bookings in the Frankfurt Book Fair's LitAg are 6% up on 2017, when a record number of agents and rights professionals attended.

Full details on the literary agencies' hotlists for the Frankfurt Book Fair are listed here.