Redfern returns to publishing to join Headline

Martin Redfern, currently executive director at Northbank Talent Management, will be joining the non-fiction team at Headline Publishing Group as publisher on 6th February 2023.

Redfern has been a literary agent for nearly six years and is responsible for the agency’s non-fiction books representation. His clients include Iain Dale, Chris Mason, Paul Brand, Brian Cox, Anthony Seldon and Camilla Cavendish.  

Before that, as editorial director at HarperCollins and BBC Books, Redfern published authors ranging from Peter Mandelson, John Major and Simon Schama to Jonathan Dimbleby, Dan Snow and Tom Burgis. 

In his new role at Headline Redfern will be looking for a wide range of quality, award-winning non-fiction with mass commercial appeal. He will focus in particular on politics and current affairs from across the political spectrum as well as bestselling history, military, popular science, smart thinking and business books, and memoir. He will report to Headline publishing director Sarah Emsley.

Redfern said: ”I’ve had an exhilarating time at Northbank, representing a fast-growing number of super-talented authors. 

“It is a wrench to leave, but I cannot resist the lure of publishing and the chance to build my own list with the backing of Sarah and the stellar team at Headline which I have admired for years. I am very excited about this new challenge.”

Emsley said: “I have known Martin for my entire publishing career. Over the past two decades, I have watched with admiration as he published some of the most impressive serious non-fiction books of our time and represented some of the brightest and best minds of the moment.

“He is both a kind and generous colleague and a gifted publisher with a flair for securing authors with the very highest of profiles. I am absolutely delighted to be welcoming him to the team and to be working with him again.”