Picador nets ‘unnerving’ novel of ancient Rome from Hynes

Picador has netted Sparrow, an “exhilarating” historical fiction novel from James Hynes. 

Ravi Mirchandani, editor-in-chief, acquired world rights, including US and audio, from Neil Olson at Massie & McQuilkin Literary Agency. Rights have also been pre-empted by dtv in Germany and Gutkind in Denmark. The novel will be published in hardback on 4th May 2023. 

Sparrow follows Jacob, the last Roman in an abandoned British Roman town. The synopsis continues: “Raised in a brothel on the Spanish coast in the waning years of the Roman Empire, a boy of no known origin creates his own identity. He is Sparrow, who sings without reason and can fly from trouble. His world is a kitchen, the herb-scented garden, then the loud and dangerous tavern, and finally the mysterious upstairs where the ‘wolves’ – prostitutes of every ethnic background and from the furthest reaches of the empire – do their (to him) mysterious business. When not being told stories by his beloved ‘mother’ Euterpe, he runs errands for her lover the cook, while trying to avoid the blows of their brutal overseer or the machinations of the chief wolf, Melpomene. A hard fate awaits Sparrow, one that involves suffering, murder, mayhem, and the scattering of the little community that has been his whole world.”