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Taproot Press has scooped Joshua in the Sky, a memoir filled with "strength and compassion" by Rodge Glass.
Publisher Patrick Jamieson acquired UK and Commonwealth rights from Jenny Brown at Jenny Brown Associates, for publication in summer 2024.
The synopsis says: "Set across England and Scotland, the book tells the story of one man’s attempt to come to make sense of the death of his nephew from a rare blood condition both share. Having spent a lifetime using reading and writing as a way to face the world while suffering from chronic illnesses including the little understood HHT [hereditary haemorrhagic telangiectasia], the author seeks to make Joshua in the Sky a kind of reckoning, asking the questions: whose life deserves to be remembered? And how?"
Glass is the author of eight books including his biography Alasdair Gray: A Secretary’s Biography (Bloomsbury), which won the Somerset Maugham Award for Non-Fiction. His most recent book is Michel Faber: The Writer & His Work (Liverpool University Press), and he is senior lecturer in creative writing at the University of Strathclyde in Glasgow.
Jamieson said: "It is a privilege to be working with Rodge Glass on bringing his remarkable memoir, Joshua in the Sky, to life. In Joshua in the Sky Rodge has written a book full to the brim with life, a book of love, folly, humour, strength and compassion.
"It is a book grounded in Scotland, but one that looks beyond our borders, revealing universal truths in sometimes the most unlikely places. It is a perfect fit for our list, and I look forward to the journey ahead."
Glass added: "Joshua in the Sky is both an autobiography and a biography of my nephew Joshua who died from our shared blood condition. It’s a sensitive topic – this is the first book published in the UK about experiences of HHT, and I have put it together with the support of Joshua’s parents.
"So it was especially important to me to find a publisher I felt comfortable working with closely on the manuscript. I’ve really admired the work Taproot have done with writers like Eleanor Thom and Linda Cracknell, who navigate the real and the unreal with sensitivity, and I feel I’ve found the perfect publisher for my book."