Overnight pre-empt sees criminal defence lawyer Mancini move from Head of Zeus to Century

Century has snared criminal defence lawyer Ruth Mancini’s "deliciously vertiginous" thriller, The Woman on the Ledge, and one other novel in an overnight pre-empt that sees the author move from Head of Zeus (One Dark, Two Light and In the Blood) to the Penguin Random House imprint.

Publisher  Selina Walker, acquired British Commonwealth rights, excluding Canada, in the two novels by Mancini in a 24-hour pre-empt from Judith Murray at Greene & Heaton. It is scheduled for publication in January 2024.

Walker describesThe Woman on the Ledge as one of the most “twisty turny” thrillers she has read recently. It opens with the arrest of the protagonist, Tate Kinsella, for murder: a woman has fallen from the twenty-fifth-floor roof terrace above the bank where Tate works. Tate has confessed to having been alone with the victim inside the building moments before she died. At the police station, Tate protests her innocence, telling her lawyer that she believes she’s been framed. However, it soon becomes clear that Tate is withholding secrets. But who is she protecting? And why?

Walker describes the book as “deliciously vertiginous and utterly thrilling. You are pulled in from the very first chapter – you can see the woman on the ledge looking into the abyss – and you are not let go for a single moment. There is a particularly chilling moment about a third of the way through in which the author expertly pulls the narrative inside out and you realise you’re reading something else entirely.

“I knew I needed to acquire this for Century as soon as I started reading it. I am very much looking forward to introducing The Woman on the Ledge to loads more appreciative readers in 2024, and to making it one of Century’s break-out thrillers,” she said.

Mancini commented: “The Woman on the Ledge is the book I have always wanted to write and I am thrilled to have found such a wonderful home for it at Century.”