Muswell Press snaps up Best Friends by Andrew Meehan

Muswell Press has snapped up Best Friends by Andrew Meehan, for publication in May 2025.

Publisher Sarah Beal bought world English rights, excluding North America, from Sarah Williams at the Sophie Hicks Agency.

"June cleans houses," the synopsis says. "Ray is a janitor at the public tennis courts in Dun Laoghaire. After lives spent picking up the pieces, he’s not romantic material, and she’s not even friend material. When it comes to learning how to be with other people at the age of 70 plus, they are unlikely companions, even more unlikely friends."

The author has published three other books and teaches Creative Writing at the University of Strathclyde in Glasgow. "The characters of June Wylie and Ray announced themselves to me one day last summer," he said. "I imagined them walking along the seafront... I was curious enough to want to follow them over the course of a novel."

Publishers Kate and Sarah Beal added: "We love Andrew’s spare, eloquent, witty writing and have been pursuing him for years now, so we are delighted that he has come to us with this beautifully crafted, gorgeous, and touching story of late life love ... This is writing to be cherished and savoured, Best Friends promises to become a much-loved classic."