Serpent's Tail snaps up 'devastating' memoir from Fuller

Serpent’s Tail will publish a new memoir by British-Zimbabwean author Alexandra Fuller.

Publisher Hannah Westland acquired UK and Commonwealth rights excluding Canada rights in Travel Light, Move Fast a new memoir by Fuller from Zoe Waldie at RCW on behalf of Melanie Jackson LLC.

Serpent’s Tail will publish Travel Light, Move Fast in hardback and export trade paperback in September 2019. The book will be published by Penguin Press in the US in August 2019.

As the child of white settler farmers in Southern Africa, Fuller has previously written about her unusual upbringing and its complex legacy in Don’t Let’s Go to the Dogs Tonight (Picador). “In this remarkable new book, she faces the death of her father, and returns to the Africa of her childhood, where she tries to reckon with his legacy and life without him,” Serpent’s Tail said. “She also contends with family breakdown, new love found and lost, and a further unimaginably tragic bereavement, all the while holding fast to the lessons her father taught her about how to survive, whatever life throws at you.” 

Westland said: ”I have been a fervent and obsessive fan of Alexandra Fuller’s writing since the publication of her first extraordinary book. Since then she has established herself as one of the finest writers of memoir at work today. This stunning book, while devastating, is full of unquenchable life, energy, and humour, and is ultimately as uplifting as anything I can remember reading. It’s a book that has seared itself onto our hearts and minds here, one that should be absorbed, talked about, and remembered. We are absolutely thrilled to be publishing it and can’t wait to share it with the world in September.”