Corsair seizes ex-Downing Street aide Watson’s debut satirical novel Whips 

Whips, the debut novel by ex-Downing Street aide Cleo Watson, has been signed by Corsair. 

Publisher James Gurbutt acquired UK and Commonwealth rights from Caroline Michel at PFD. It will be published in hardback, export, e-book, and audio on 25th May.

Watson has worked in politics and campaigning for over a decade. She worked on President Barack Obama’s re-election in 2012, the 2017 and 2019 UK general elections and the Vote Leave campaign in the 2016 EU referendum.

In government, she served in 10 Downing Street as Theresa May’s political adviser then Boris Johnson’s co-deputy chief of staff. 

Set in Westminster in the 2020s, "where the business of governing is the last thing on the agenda for anyone worth their salt", Whips  is described by the publisher as a timely satire on politics and Party people.

The synopsis reads: “In the SW1 bubble, politics moves fast, schemes are hatched and foiled—through both accident and conspiracy—within hours, and sex and power preside. When Bobby Cliveden decided to campaign against the closure of her local mental health unit, she scarcely thought it would take her straight to the heart of the UK’s bustling political centre.

“She heads to London to work for her local MP, the ambitious Simon Daly, and moves in with her two old university friends, Jess, a new lobby journalist, and Eva, a junior Downing Street adviser. The three of them quickly become wrapped up in the political circus of glamorous parties, insufferable bosses, and demanding workloads—and the desire to win. Beneath the headline-grabbing battle of a male-dominated leadership contest, they discover the secret, soft-skilled machinery behind so much political change at the very highest level of government: women.”

The publisher said: “Watson takes us behind the doors of Number 10 and delivers a gripping tale of modern government, filled with intrigue and scandal and written with insight and verve".