Bloomsbury General wins debut novel by Moira Macdonald

Bloomsbury General has acquired a debut novel by Moira Macdonald, described as "a celebration of love, friendship and books".

Publishing director Darcy Nicholson bought UK and Commonwealth rights, excluding Canada but including audio, to Storybook Ending by Seattle Times arts critic Macdonald. The deal was brokered in a "hotly contested" auction by Katie Greenstreet at Paper Literary, and the book will be published in Summer 2025. Allison Hunter of Trellis Literary sold US rights to Maya Ziv at Penguin Random House US.

"When lonely tech worker April leaves a note in a book for Westley, the hot guy at the bookstore, she is trying to push herself out of her comfort zone," the synopsis reads. "She has no idea that the note will actually be picked up by Laura, who believes it to have come from that same guy at the bookstore. Needless to say, Westley remains entirely oblivious. Thus begins an accidental love triangle and a gorgeous story of friendship and the value of human connection."

Nicholson said: "If Nora Ephron and Richard Curtis collaborated on a friendship love story set in a Seattle bookstore, Storybook Ending would be it. Moira has created a gorgeous, funny cast of characters, who will entertain and surprise their reader to the very end. We are so proud to be publishing Moira’s work on the Bloomsbury General list."

Macdonald added: "Ever since my days as an English-lit student, the name ‘Bloomsbury’ has been magical to me. So it seemed foreordained, in the most wonderful of ways, that my first novel—which is, at its heart, a love letter to books, bookshops and the written word—will be released by Bloomsbury in the UK."

Greenstreet commented: "Nostalgic, witty, and warm—this is a story to savour over a cup of tea, and to then press into the hands of your bibliophile friends. I couldn’t be happier to have placed this novel with a house as storied in the literary world as Bloomsbury, and with Darcy as its frontline champion in the UK!"