Aurum Press bags first non-fiction work by Menmuir

Aurum Press has scooped the first work of non-fiction on life by the sea in Cornwall by Man Booker-nominated novelist Wyl Menmuir.

Katie Bond, publisher, bought world English rights for The Draw of the Sea from Peter Straus at RCW for publication in print, e-book and audiobook in June 2023. Menmuir was longlisted for the Booker Prize for his debut novel The Many (Salt) in 2016.

The publisher said: "Cornwall with its 300 beaches and over 400 miles of coastline has perennial, global appeal. Daphne du Maurier, Agatha Christie, Poldark and the recent popular BBC documentary 'Cornwall: This Fishing Life' brought in a record five million visitors in staycation summer 2020 and Cornwall has been voted the UK’s favourite holiday destination for the last eight years at the British Travel Awards. The Draw of the Sea will evoke both the specific and the universal appeal of the sea in the same way that James Rebanks did in The Shepherd’s Life: A Tale of the Lake District (Allen Lane)."

Bond said: “I published a short story by Wyl Menmuir about Cheddar Gorge when I was at the National Trust and he’s brilliant at conjuring up the spirit of a place. Wyl is a passionate advocate for nature, deeply embedded in his local Cornish community and, more often than not, to be found on the beach or on the water. I couldn’t be more thrilled to be publishing such a fantastic writer on the draw of the sea.”

Menmuir added: “There are few days when I don’t go down to the sea for one reason or another. It’s ritual and routine. I live a mile from the Atlantic. I swim, surf, bodysurf, sail, paddle, splash and walk along the coast. We’re an island nation, we’re shaped by the sea. I am dissecting the ways in which we gravitate to the element that surrounds us, that comforts and threatens us, that gives joy and takes lives. It feels timely to be writing about our relationship with the sea at a moment when we’re increasingly exploring how to protect our oceans and the life within them. And I’m delighted that The Draw of the Sea will be published by Katie Bond and the team at Aurum.”