Faber snaps up Banville crime novel in two-book deal

Man Booker Prize-winner John Banville has signed a two-book deal with Faber. 

Editorial director Angus Cargill acquired the UK & Commonwealth rights to Snow, and a second book, from Alba Ziegler-Bailey at the Wylie Agency. Faber will publish Snow in October 2020. Hanover Square will publish simultaneously in the US. 

Cargill described the novel as a "beautifully written homage to the greats". He added: "We are thrilled to bring a writer of John’s stature to the Faber list, and excited to see a writer so masterfully in control of his material. Snow is a dark, compelling treat for all lovers of classic crime."

Banville was born in Wexford, Ireland, in 1945. He is the author of 17 novels, including The Book of Evidence (Prentice Hall & IBD), 2005 Man Booker-winner The Sea (Alfred A Knopf), and the Quirke Series of crime novels under the pen name Benjamin Black. He has sold 445,706 books for £3.5m through the TCM, with The Sea his bestseller on 160,985 copies. 

Snow, which will be the first of Banville’s crime novels to be published under his own name, is a "chilling, 1950s-set, murder mystery which opens with the discovery of the body of a parish priest in the Library at Ballyglass House, the County Wexford family seat of the aristocratic, secretive Osborne family", reads the synopsis. "When Detective Inspector St John Strafford arrives from Dublin to investigate he is met with a conspiracy of silence as the snow continues to fall."