You are viewing your 1 free article this month. Login to read more articles.
Fairlight Books signs bookseller Jenna Warren’s The Hometown Bookshop
Fairlight Books has acquired bookseller Jenna Warren’s second novel, The Hometown Bookshop, for publication in August 2025. World rights, including audio, were acquired by publisher and founder Louise Boland directly from the author.
The novel is set in a seaside town in northern England and follows Charlotte, a glamorous West End actress who finds herself out of work and back in her hometown, where she takes a summer job at the local independent bookshop. An unlikely friendship blossoms between her and Greg, the grumpy manager, when she discovers his secret passion for community theatre.
“With all the warmth, humour and tenderness of Warren’s debut novel The Moon and Stars, The Hometown Bookshop is an uplifting story about books, theatre and stepping outside your comfort zone,” the publisher said.
Continues…
Read More
Warren was born in Middlesbrough and grew up in Saltburn-by-the-Sea. She studied theatre at the University of Hull, and completed an MA in Creative Writing at Teesside University. Her stories have featured in the anthologies Whitby Abbey: Pure Inspiration and Through the Cracks: The Teesside Literary Society’s Inaugural Anthology. After she worked for several years as an assistant in an art gallery, her passion for books led her to open Book Corner, an independent bookshop in Saltburn.
She said: “The Hometown Bookshop is a novel about two of my passions: bookshops and theatre. I’ve had great fun finding ways for these different worlds to collide, and I can’t wait for readers to meet Charlotte and Greg. I’m delighted the novel has found a home with Fairlight Books, who did such a beautiful job publishing my debut The Moon and Stars.”
