Faber wins six-way auction for Natasha Brown's second novel Universality

Faber has snapped up Universality, the second novel from Natasha Brown, the critically acclaimed author of Assembly (Hamish Hamilton). 

Publisher Alex Bowler acquired UK and Commonwealth rights, excluding Canada, and European Union rights from Emma Paterson at Aitken Alexander in a six-way auction. Rights have also been sold in the US (Random House), Canada (Knopf), Germany (Suhrkamp), France (Grasset), Spain (Anagrama) and Norway (Cappelen Damm). 

Brown introduced and read from the novel at Faber’s annual Spring Party last night (4th February) at Bishopsgate Institute, London, where guests were given an exclusive newspaper-inspired sampler. Faber authors Lucy Caldwell, Andrew O’Hagan and Richard Ayoade also spoke about their upcoming works.  

Brown’s new book is scheduled to publish on 13th March 2025 and will be supported by “a major, agenda-setting campaign” Faber said.  

“On a Yorkshire farm, a man is brutally bludgeoned with a solid gold bar” the synopsis begins. “A plucky young journalist sets out to uncover the truth surrounding the attack, connecting the dots between an amoral banker landlord, an iconoclastic columnist, and a radical anarchist movement. She solves the mystery, but her viral longread exposé raises more questions than it answers.” 

Universality is billed as “a twisty, slippery descent into the rhetoric of truth and power” which, “focuses in on words: what we say, how we say it, and what we really mean”. 

Bowler said: “Natasha’s arrival is a very significant moment for the Faber list. She is among the most distinctive writers to emerge in Britain over the past decade. Her work uses the slippery possibilities of fiction to open up fresh ground, new feelings, new questions. Universality has some of the pleasures of a mystery, a puzzle for the reader to solve – and delivers, I think, some stinging truths.” 

Brown added: “I can’t wait to share Universality with readers. It’s a novel that serves up big stylistic twists with an even bigger sense of fun. Faber is the perfect home for this book, and I’m excited to work with Alex and the team over the coming months.” 

Natasha was named one of Granta’s Best of Young British Novelists in 2023 and one of the Observer’s Best Debut Novelists in 2021. Assembly was shortlisted for the Folio Prize, the Goldsmiths Prize and the Orwell Prize for Fiction and has been translated into 17 languages.