Overview of rights: towards Frankfurt
At the Frankfurter Buchmesse in 2018. This year’s fair takes place from October 19 to 23. Image: FBM: Marc Jacquemin
By Porter Anderson, Editor | @Porter_Anderson
See also: Frankfurter Buchmesse: tickets for trade visitors are now on sale
IIf you’re just catching up with the disturbing news of today’s (August 12) stabbing attack on author Salman Rushdie, we’ve got an updated story here.
The incident, which happened onstage this morning just before 11 a.m. local time in upstate New York in Chautauqua, of course shocked many global editors and prompted a brief statement from Frankfurter Buchmesse as we await information on Rushdie’s condition in hospital: “We condemn this cowardly attack on Salman Rushdie and wish him well.” We continue to follow the development of this disturbing news in our main article on the incident.
Rushdie, 75, has a new book slated for release Feb. 7 from Penguin Random House: city of victory is described by the publisher as “the epic of a woman who breathes a fantasy empire into existence, only to be consumed by it down the centuries”.
And meanwhile, our pre-Frankfurt Rights Roundup, one of many before hitting the show (October 19-23), has work from Finland, France, Norway, Spain and Brazil.
As in every roundup, we use some of the sales copy provided to us by agents and rights directors, editing this copy to give you an idea of the nature and tone of a book, but by limiting the promotional elements. If you wish to submit an offer to Publication prospectssee the instructions at the end of this article.
The black book of football
By Hannu Aaltonen and Tapio Keskitalo
- Editor: Otava, Helsinki, publishes in September
- Contact rights: Elina Ahlbäck at Ahlback Agency
- Book information: Learn more here
Sales of rights declared:
- Most recent – Estonia: Helios
“This timely title speaks to corruption and scandal in today’s football.
Hannu Aaltonen and Tapio Keskitalo
“Since the turn of the century, international football has become a pompous, money-driven business. ‘The Beautiful Game’ has become a playground with its own laws, a place where oligarchs, sheikhs and American billionaires go wild.
“This startling book delves into the outrageously rich and powerful football clubs that disregard the economic rules of football. Influential football bosses and governing bodies have been mired in bribery scandals, while small football countries have to count the pennies.
“The grotesque development culminates with the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar, where authorities and organizers don’t care about the costs or the deaths of construction workers.”
Aaltonen and Keskitalo are editors at STT, the Finnish News Agency.
Handbook of penteados for Crianças Negras
(Hairstyle Handbook for Black Kids)
By Joana Gabriela Mendes and Mari Santos
Illustrator: Flavia Borges
- Editor: Grupo Companhia das Letras, Sao Paulo
- Contact rights: Stéphanie Barrouillet, SB Rights Agency
- Book information: Learn more here
No sale of rights reported at this time.
“A unique non-fiction manual combining practical information on basic care and history.
From left to right, Joana Mendez, Mari Santos and Flávia Borges
“An afro is both a haircut and a hairstyle in which the hair is large and natural. Did you know that with the revival of identity in the 1960s, there was an appreciation for black beauty and aesthetics represented by the motto “Black is Beautiful”?
“Natural hair then became a powerful political symbol of black pride.
“In addition to hairstyles, readers will find the origin of each and curiosities about hair care throughout history, such as information on the Black Power movement, what Afrofuturism is, who the Black Panthers were. , among others.
“With neat illustrations full of color and detail by Flávia Borges, this manual is an invitation for children, teenagers and adults to experience a moment of fashion, fun and self-discovery.”
Aborted, an intimate story of abortion
(Addresses, an intimate story of voluntary termination of pregnancy)
By Pauline Hermange
- Editor: Editions Daronnes, Villejuif
- Contact rights: Julie Finidori, Julie Finidori Agency
- Book information: Learn more here
Sales of rights declared:
- Most recent – English: Scribe
- Spanish: Columna
- German: Rowohlt
Pauline Hermange
« Pauline Harmange’s book Aborted is an intimate and documented essay on her own abortion.
“While the right to abortion is regularly questioned in France and all over the world, she presents here the emotions, reflections and contradictions that one can have when one is a feminist and confronted in one’s flesh with abortion.
“It is a resolutely political vision that the author presents: to give back power to all our experiences to make our society better.
Hermange, feminist activist, published Me men, I hate them and released it in September 2020.
Fifteen
By Vigdis Hjorth
- Editor: Cappelen Damm Agency, Oslo, for publication later this year
- Contact rights: Ingvild Haugland Blatt, Cappelen Damm Agency
- Book information: Learn more here
Reported rights sales, pre-publication:
- Most recent – Sweden: Natur & Culture
- Denmark: Turbine
- Hungary: Polar Egyesület
Vigdis Hjorth
“The summer when she was 15, Paula discovered the pile of letters her mother wrote to grandmother.
“The life his mother describes in the letters is unrecognizable, describing events that did not happen. Her mother’s pretentiousness comes as a shock to Paula, who is now surrounded by the lies of an adult.
“How should she behave with her mother? Who can she be in the family now? Paula is about to become a teenager and the world opens up before her as a terrible and wonderful place. She doesn’t want to believe in the god her mother claims to believe in. She doesn’t want to start lying about her life.
mauve
(Malverine)
By Susanna Isern
Illustrated by Laura Proietti
- Editor: Flamboyant Editorial, Barcelona
- Contact rights: Marina Huguet, Flamboyant Editorial
- Book information: Learn more here
Sales of rights declared:
- Most recent – Italian: Gallucci
- Czech: Host
- Galician: Triqueta Verde
- German: Jumbo Median
- Korean: Jiyansa
- Slovak: Ikar
Susanna Isern, left, and Laura Proietti
It is the opening title of a series of novels for “early readers”.
“Meet Mauverine, a brave 9-year-old girl who wants to become a witch.
“She decides to take her destiny into her own hands and visits the three witches ruling over her city, feared for their terrifying spells. Eager to find an heiress, they train Mauverine to become one of them. Magic potions, steaming cauldrons, flying broomsticks and spooky spells.
The Seer of Etampes
(The Seer of Stamps)
By Abel Quentin
- Editor: Editions de l’Obervatoire, Paris
- Contact rights: Sandrine Paccher, Editions de l’Observatoire
- Book information: Learn more here
Sales of rights declared:
- Most recent – German: Matthes and Seitz
- Spanish: Libros del Asteroide
- Italian: E/O
- Japanese: Kadowaka
- Latvia; Zvaigne ABC
- Portuguese: Guerra & Paz
- Slovak: Arthur
“’I was going to ward off the spell, the evil eye that had stuck to my train for nearly 30 years. The Seer of Etampes would be my rebirth and the first day of my new life. I was going to buy back one last time, to redo myself on a more confidential register, but less dangerous.
Abel Quentin
“Alcoholic and freshly retired from university, Jean Roscoff embarked on writing a book to get back in the saddle: The Seer of Etampesan essay on an unknown American poet killed while driving in Essonne in the early 1990s.
“A priori, not enough to unleash criticism. What if his subject was trapped?
“Abel Quentin recounts the fall of a romantic and cynical anti-hero, in the era of social networks and identity theft. And draws, with humour, the portrait of a generation.
Submit Rights Agreements to Publishing Perspectives
Do you have any rights transactions to report? Agents and Rights Directors can use our Rights Grant Submission Form to send us the information we need. If you have any questions, please send them to Porter@PublishingPerspectives.com
Send us pictures. Please do not send us images through Google Drive if the system requires us to ask your permission to retrieve those images. (It may take too long for our timelines before this permission request reaches you.) Likewise, please do not send us images via WeTransfer or a similar service. (These expire, often before we can upload your material.) If for some reason you can’t get images in our submission form, please email them to us ( Porter@PublishingPerspectives.com) or in a Dropbox folder (access without expiration date) and send us a link to this folder in the submission form.
Categories. We get more submissions in children’s books than others, and while we value children’s books in the industry as much as anyone – keep sending them – we’d also like to see more of the following to help us balance our raids:
- adult fiction
- Adult non-fiction – especially narrative non-fiction, political, historical, biographical, memoir, and philosophical categories
- young adult
Repeat submissions. We get great submissions from many parts of the world and once we have a title we would like to give other work a chance to be featured rather than repeating that title – unless there is is there any major news developing around this previously used title that makes it a good candidate for a second listing. If one of your titles has been listed in our rights roundup before but there’s a good reason why you think it should be listed again, be sure to email us and let us know (Porter@PublishingPerspectives.com).
We look forward to hearing from you.
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