Oyeyemi joins Faber for 'brilliant' novel

Faber is to publish Helen Oyeyemi's latest novel Peaces, next year. 

Louisa Joyner, associate publisher, acquired UK and Commonwealth (excluding Canada) and audio rights for Peaces from Tracy Bohan at the Wylie Agency. Oyeyemi has previously been published by presses including Methuen, Bloomsbury and Picador.

Joyner said: "This is Helen Oyeyemi’s first novel with Faber and it is our joy and honour to be publishing this brilliant, wise, strange and, above all, beautiful novel and welcoming its famously talented author to our list."

The synopsis explains: "Peaces is the story of Otto and Xavier Shin, a couple who embark from Kent on a mysterious train that takes them far beyond any destination they could have anticipated. As the carriages roll along they become embroiled in intrigue—who is Ava Kapoor, the sole full-time inhabitant of the train, and what is her relationship to a man named Prem? Are they passengers or prisoners? We discover who orchestrated the journey, hurtling them all into their past for clues."

Oyeyemi has sold 49,640 books for £401,277 through Nielsen BookScan's UK Total Consumer Market, with The Icarus Girl (Bloomsbury) her bestseller, at 20,799 copies sold in paperback. She has also won the Somerset Maugham Award and was listed on Granta's Best of Young British Novelists in 2021. 

Commenting on the acquisition, she said: "Faber is such a significant source of the compellingly contemporary. It's both a delight and a truly meaningful encouragement for my writing to be published alongside works that are so important to my life as a reader."

The novel is scheduled for publication on 4th November 2021, with an export edition to be released on 1st April 2021.