Scholastic scoops ‘genre defying’ YA debut from McLeod

Scholastic UK has landed Rapunzella, Or Don’t Touch My Hair, a "fairytale reimagining in verse" combined with a contemporary coming-of-age story by poet Ella McLeod, in a three-book deal.  

Yasmin Morrissey, commissioning editor, acquired world rights from Stephen Thwaites and Isobel Gahan at Curtis Brown, as part of a deal for two novels and a picture book. Rapunzella will be published July 2022.  

The synopsis explains: “Rapunzella is imprisoned in an enchanted forest made of her own Afro and the might of the evil King Charming seems unstoppable. But is it? Meanwhile, in a contemporary city reminiscent of south-east London, the real world protagonist is 15 and spends their time at school and at Val’s hair salon with Baker the boxer. The salon is a space of safety, but also of possibility and dreams… Dreams of hair so rich and alive that it grows upwards and outwards into a wild landscape, becomes trees and leaves, and houses birds and butterflies and all the secret creatures that belong in such a forest…”  

Thwaites and Gahan said: “We fell in love with Ella’s writing from the first page of Rapunzella – combining beautiful lyricism and storytelling power she captures both big themes and emotions as well as the subtle nuances of feeling that speak to the complexities of growing up.”  

Morrissey commented: “It is a timely, thought-provoking celebration of the power of Black identity and Black hair – it is not every day that you can say that an author is genre-defining and defying, but those are the waves Ella will make in the YA market. We are so thrilled and proud to be publishing her.”  

McLeod added: “I wrote Rapunzella for all the girls like me. The ones who love magic, fantasy and fairytale, but have often felt that they don’t belong. The ones who perhaps need magic more than most and have been too long denied it by tumbling golden locks and limited imaginations. I want kids who’ve felt invisible to peer into the pages of my book and see themselves looking back, whether that’s through the eyes of Baker, the boxer who loves to braid, or as part of a coven of witches who create life in unexpected ways. Dreaming should always be encouraged, fantasising is food for the soul… so eat up!”