Indigo swipes Hughes' 'haunting' debut novel

The Indigo Press has bagged Pearl, the debut novel by Siân Hughes, inspired by the medieval poem of the same name. 

Susie Nicklin, publisher, acquired world rights in all languages from Peter Buckman at The Ampersand Agency.

"Marianne is eight years old when her mother goes missing," the synopsis says. "Left behind with her baby brother and grieving father in a ramshackle house on the edge of a small village, she clings to the fragmented memories of her mother’s love; the smell of fresh herbs, the games they played, and the songs and stories of her childhood.

"As time passes, Marianne struggles to adjust, fixated on her mother’s disappearance and the secrets she’s sure her father is keeping from her. Discovering a medieval poem called ’Pearl’ and trusting in its promise of consolation, Marianne sets out to make a visual illustration of it, a task that she returns to over and over but somehow never manages to complete.

"Tormented by an unmarked gravestone in an abandoned chapel and the tidal pull of the river, her childhood home begins to crumble as the past leads her down a path of self-destruction. But can art heal Marianne? And will her own future as a mother help her find peace?

Hughes is a writer who grew in up a small village in Cheshire where the story of Pearl is set. Returning to live there after her mother’s death, she borrowed from the medieval poem "Pearl" to write a story set in an old house she regularly cycled past.

"I am new to being a bookseller and new to being a novelist, but my love of reading has saved my life for as long as I can remember: writing Pearl was an act of gratitude to all the books that have shaped me and kept me company, as well as an act of courage in daring to join all my heroes in print," she said.

"As an undergraduate I was captivated by ’Pearl’, the medieval poem presumed to be by the author of ’Gawain and the Green Knight’," Nicklin said. "Siân has taken this classic text and used it as the basis of a novel which only a true poet could write, with beautiful language, a haunting story, and all the emotion and transcendence of the original. It’s a joy to read and I can’t wait to share it with retailers and our audience."

Her first collection of poetry, The Missing (Salt, 2009) was longlisted for the Guardian First Book Award, shortlisted for the Felix Dennis and Aldeburgh prizes, and won the Seamus Heaney Award. It included the elegy "The Send-Off", which won the 2006 Arvon International Poetry Competition.