Viking pre-empts Flock's 'astonishing' book about women and violence

Viking has pre-empted The Furies: Women, Vengeance and Justice by Elizabeth Flock, an Emmy-winning journalist.  

Alpana Sajip, non-fiction editor, acquired UK and Commonwealth rights from Fiona Baird at WME in a pre-empt. It will be published in hardback, e-book and audio in March 2024. Emily Griffin, senior editor at HarperCollins US, has acquired North American rights from Suzanne Gluck. 

“In The Furies, Flock examines the lives of three unforgettable women who chose to use lethal force to gain power, safety, and freedom when the institutions meant to protect them – government, police, courts – utterly failed to do so,” Viking said. “Brittany Smith, a young woman from Stevenson, Alabama, killed a man she said raped her in her own home, but was denied the protection of a self-defence argument; Angoori Dahariya led a gang in Uttar Pradesh, India, dedicated to avenging victims of domestic abuse; and Cicek Mustafa Zibo fought in a thousands-strong all-female militia that battled ISIS in Syria. Each woman has been criticised for their actions by those who believe that violence is never the answer; yet each has transmuted a story of disempowerment into a story of resistance.

“In luminous prose, Elizabeth Flock asks searching questions about cultures in which deeply ingrained ideas about masculinity and women have helped breed the violence that women face."

Sajip said: “I was utterly gripped from the first page of Elizabeth’s astonishing book and genuinely could not put it down. Her writing is urgent and propulsive, and the stories of these three women are not only deeply researched but also searingly rendered on the page. Their anger and determination vibrate from these intimate character studies, and offer hope not only to the women around them but to readers too. I can’t wait to publish this at Viking and bring these important and unforgettable stories to a much wider audience.” 

Flock commented: “I’m so excited to be working with Viking and the wonderful Alpana Sajip to publish The Furies. This book has been a long labour of love: to intimately get to know these three women, to channel their frustration and anger onto the page, and to understand whether violence as self-defence helps or harms in the end. I hope you all will fall in love with these women, as I have, and understand why they acted as they did.” 

Flock is a journalist and the author of Love and Marriage in Mumbai (Harper). Her work has appeared in the New Yorker, the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Atlantic, and on the PBS NewsHour, where her investigation into sexual harassment and retaliation in the US Forest Service won an Emmy Award and was nominated for a Peabody Award. A PEN America fellow and IWMF and Pulitzer Center grantee, she lives in Chicago, Illinois.