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Aurum has acquired a memoir, Save Me From the Waves, from Jessica Hepburn, former Lyric director and the first woman in the world to have achieved the "Sea, Street, Summit Challenge".
Denise Bates, publishing director at the Quarto imprint, secured world all-language rights from Charlie Brotherstone of Brotherstone Creative Management. Save Me From The Waves is due for publication on 7th March 2024 retailing at £17.99.
Hepburn is an author, arts producer and "adventure activist", Quarto said. She is also first woman in the world to have achieved the "Sea, Street, Summit Challenge", which means she has swum the English Channel, run the London Marathon, and climbed Mount Everest.
“Save Me from The Waves shares in her distinctive, funny, insightful, often moving voice her journey from a very tough time in her life through extraordinary physical challenges to the ultimate adventure that nearly ended it all on the top of the world’s highest mountain,” Quarto said. “All against the soundtrack of over 80 years and over 3,000 episodes of her favourite radio programme, ’Desert Island Discs’, as she runs, walks, climbs and talks with the castaways and their music, their experiences and insights helping her gain an understanding of her own life and ultimately how to celebrate everything it has to offer.”
Nominated as an Amnesty International ‘Woman of Suffragette Spirit’, Stylist’s ‘Woman of the Week’ and winner of the Fertility Foundation’s ‘Fertility Hero’ Award, she is the former executive director of the Lyric Hammersmith.
Bates said: “Jessica is a self-confessed unlikely athlete and her story of exercising her way out of heartbreak and achieving these extraordinary endurance feats has the potential to resonate with everyone. But this book is about so much more than physical challenges. Jessica also illuminates the redemptive power of music and demonstrates in her inimitable, humorous style the power of an adventure to change anyone’s life for the better.”
Hepburn commented: “I am very happy to be working with the team at Aurum on my story about going from rock bottom to the top of the world, literally. I hope it makes for an entertaining, exhilarating and unique read. Above all I want to inspire readers to feel that an adventure – whether it’s high and far away or closer to home and in your head – will always change your life for the better.”
Hepburn’s debut The Pursuit of Motherhood was self-published with Matador in February 2014. Her second book, 21 Miles: swimming in search of the meaning of motherhood (Unbound), was published in May 2018 and became a ‘Mumsnet Summer Read’ and an ‘Outdoor Swimming Society Book of the Year’.