Milburn bolsters rights department with Smith in new role

The Madeleine Milburn Literary, TV & Film Agency is expanding its international rights department with Liane-Louise Smith joining on Monday (21st January) the newly created role of rights director.

Smith will oversee the international publishing strategy for all the agency’s authors, and be responsible for the continued growth of the international rights department. She will work alongside rights agent Alice Sutherland-Hawes, who will continue to handle some territories but will also dedicate more time on building the company’s children’s & YA list.

Smith started her career at Transworld before moving to the international rights team at Random House Children's Books. She has been at Furniss Lawton since 2012, where she joined as agency assistant, before being promoted to rights agent in 2014. Smith’s move to the Madeleine Milburn Agency in Mayfair on 21st January now brings the headcount to nine members of staff.

The company is now in its seventh year with founder and director Madeleine Milburn crowned Agent of the Year at the British Book Awards in 2018.  The agency has seen significant success in recent years, both in the UK and abroad, with big-selling authors such as Gail Honeyman, Fiona Barton and Holly Bourne. Recent high profile deals include Elizabeth Macneal’s The Doll Factory (Picador), which has since sold in 28 territories, and The Authenticity Project (Transworld) by Claire Pooley, which was one of the hot titles of Frankfurt Book Fair in October.

Milburn said: “We’ve always prided ourselves on the attention we give to international rights here. Every territory is important, and we want all our authors to be global bestsellers. We are therefore utterly thrilled that Liane-Louise is coming on board to help us achieve this. She has a brilliant reputation within the industry, and we are hugely excited that our authors are going to be the beneficiaries of her dynamism and ambition.”

Smith said: “I am thrilled to be joining the team at MM Agency. I hugely admire their energy, and passion for championing great story-telling, and the strong international focus they have for their authors. It's hard to ignore their many achievements to date, and I'm really pleased to be joining them at such an exciting time."

She added: "I very much look forward to helping bring their authors to an even broader international audience.”