Picador signs Stibbe’s ‘utterly delicious’ new diary

Picador has signed Nina Stibbe’s new non-fiction book Went to London, Took the Dog: A Diary, in which she relates living as a lodger in the home of novelist Deborah Moggach. 

Publisher Mary Mount acquired world English rights, and audio, from Felicity Blunt at Curtis Brown. The book will be published in November 2023, which also marks 10 years since the publication of Stibbe’s “much beloved” Love, Nina, which Mount published while at Viking.

Went to London, Took the Dog chronicles Stibbe’s return to London, the scene of Love, Nina, at the age of 61. The publisher continued: “With an empty nest at home and her dog, Peggy, by her side, Nina thinks it might be time for a change. And so, on discovering that the novelist Deborah Moggach is looking for a lodger, Nina heads off to her old North London stamping ground, to the city she has always loved but that might have changed quite a bit since she last took up residence... ” 

Mount said: “I am over the moon that we get to publish Nina Stibbe’s utterly delicious new book at Picador. Went to London, Took the Dog is the book Nina was born to write. It is one of the funniest books she’s ever written but also very moving and, as ever with Nina, her prose and her observations are completely inimitable. I can’t wait for all those fans of Love, Nina to read it.” 

Stibbe added: “Mary Mount took a massive punt on a bunch of my old letters in 2013 and did a reasonable job, so it’s only decent to give her another run out.”