Michael Joseph signs Gavanndra Hodge's memoir

Journalist Gavanndra Hodge’s “powerful” memoir has gone to Michael Joseph.

World rights were acquired by Fenella Bates, non-fiction publisher at Michael Joseph from Lizzy Kremer at David Highman Associates. The Consequences of Love by Gavanndra Hodge will publish in hardback by Michael Joseph on 11th June 2020.

The synopsis reads: “When Gavanndra was 14 years old one of the worst things imaginable happened to her family – her nine year old sister, Candy died suddenly and Gavanndra watched her already fractured family implode. Twenty-five years later, now a mother of two daughters herself, she realises she has no childhood memories of her sister – only memories of her death.”

The book is described by Michael Joseph as “a memoir about the impact of trauma and how she learnt to accept her childhood and prevent it from defining her future”. Hodge wrote of her sister an article in Tatler in 2016, and was apparently overwhelmed by the outpouring of reader’s responses to the piece.

Hodge said: “I have always found my story difficult to tell, so I hoped I would find it easier to write. In the end that wasn’t the case, but it was a transformative process, engaged with all the things that make us human - death, grief, trauma, addiction, sex, love, family, losing yourself and finding yourself again. 

"I am beyond delighted that The Consequences of Love is being published by Michael Joseph, where everyone has been so brilliant, kind and clever; and helped me write the book that has been burning inside me for so long.”

Bates added: “As human beings, we are the products of the stories we tell ourselves about who we are. Stories from our childhoods, stories from our parents, stories as we grow and learn. But what happens if the storyline you're given at the start of life isn't the one you want to define you? I am enormously proud to be publishing this book – it will have you gripped from its first heartbreaking opening scene to the final bittersweet page, and will leave you marvelling at Gavanndra's strength and courage.”

Hodge has worked in newspapers and magazines for more than 20 years, including ES Magazine and Tatler, where she was deputy editor and acting editor, and appeared in Posh People: Inside Tatler. In 2018 she left Tatler and is now a freelance writer, contributing to publications including the Sunday Times, the Times, the Telegraph and ES Magazine.