It all started with an email from my agent last Monday telling me that Jamie Byng, the publisher and managing director of the great UK independent publishing firm Canongate, had fallen hard for Harry, Revised, and it culminated two days later with a "good preempt" (in the vernacular of Publishers Lunch, although it felt more like a "fucking awesome preempt" to me) for UK and world rights (minus US) that's being reported today in The Bookseller.
Canongate m.d. Jamie Byng has pre-empted for world rights excluding North America in “the hottest début novel on the planet”. The deal for American screen writer and literary blogger Mark Sarvas’ Harry, Revised was done with Simon Lipskar at Writers House.
The novel is described by Byng as “poignant, yet at times extremely funny”. It follows complex and flawed anti-hero Harry Rent, whom Byng compares to John Updike’s Harry Angstrom, as he tries to come to terms with his wife’s death while wooing sexy waitress Molly.
Canongate, already receiving bids for French and Italian translation rights, aims to publish in spring 2009.
In the extraordinarily hectic and exciting week since, publication offers from Germany and Holland (in addition to Italy and France) have come in, and we're expecting to hear from more countries in the days ahead. The Australian publication date is already set for June 2008 with a wonderful house called Text, which publishes – among others – J.M. Coetzee. Nearly all of this is directly attributable to Jamie's remarkable, endless, irrepressible energy. He has tucked Harry under his arm and is running hard, head down, to the end zone. For the last week, I've basically been going along for the ride, sitting in the eye of a hurricane.
Anyone who has paid any attention to the publishing scene knows something about Jamie Byng, who ushered Life of Pi to a Booker prize, and has a list of smart, edgy literary authors – think Dan Rhodes and Scarlett Thomas. You can read a bit more about him in this 2005 Scotsman interview.
So what does this all mean on a practical front? Right now it's mostly lots of excited phone calls and emails flying around as each new market brings new publishers into play. We've also already begun working with Text, the Australian publisher, because of a peculiarity in copyright law that requires Australia to assert their own copyright within 30 days of the American publication (which is coming from Bloomsbury on April 15), lest the Australian market end up flooded with American editions. I'm not exactly sure why this should be so, or why a similar concern doesn't affect the UK, and it's something I've been meaning to ask my agent but, in truth, there are so many questions I have and it's all happening so quickly that it will take a while to sort things out.
(UPDATE: My agent, Simon Lipskar, explains it: "Here's the answer: The peculiarity in copyright law is actually Australia's, which is why this doesn't effect the UK; in an effort to insure that books published in English elsewhere in the world were imported to Australia, the Australian legislature passed a law saying that if an Australian edition failed to publish, or a publisher claiming exclusivity failed to export its edition within 30 days of publication anywhere else in the world, then it was legal to import any edition into Australia, regardless of territorial and contractual agreements. So, if Text doesn't publish within 30 days of Bloomsbury, any Australian bookstore could order Bloomsbury's edition. In the UK, there is no such law, though it is of course legal for bookstores to sell whatever editions they want (which is why you can buy British editions on Amazon.com), so the publisher can publish whenever without risking losing its exclusive right to publish the text in that market. make sense?" It does. Thank you.)
For now, the edited typeset manuscript has been returned to Bloomsbury, and next week we begin to discuss our marketing and publicity strategies, including possible book tour stops. (It's worth noting, by the way, that the extraordinary reaction from Canongate and the rest of the world is very much a testament to my editor at Bloomsbury, Colin Dickerman, who really helped me transform this novel into its present form.) And with any luck, in the days ahead, I'll be able to tell you who my various European publishers are. And on top of it all, it sounds like we might even have some news on the film rights front in the not-too-distant future, though that's very much up in the air.
An unforgettable week, the kind that most writers dream of. It's going to make for a wonderful holiday season around here. Thanks to all of you for staying interested and following along. More updates soon.
Congratulations the world over(hee, hee)- what a wonderful bit of news first thing in the morning!
Cheers!
Posted by: callie | December 07, 2007 at 08:03 AM
Fantastic fucking news, Mark. Congratulations!
Posted by: ed | December 07, 2007 at 08:27 AM
Good stuff. I have been following all the updates. Congratulations!
On a tangential note (and since it features in this post), can one enact a law/rule to stop using the word "poignant" already when reviewing books. It shows up alarmingly in almost every blurb I read and is as my kids would say it's getting "vomitrocious."
Poignant, limn, and roil. There oughta be a law :-)
Good work!
Posted by: Poornima | December 07, 2007 at 08:36 AM
That's really great news, Mark. It must be hard to remain seated long enough to post. I know I'd be jumping around my apartment. Congratulations!
Posted by: Mogolov | December 07, 2007 at 08:42 AM
That is fabulous news. Congratulations!
Posted by: ack | December 07, 2007 at 11:05 AM
Wow.
Posted by: Dan Green | December 07, 2007 at 11:11 AM
Local boy makes good. How long before John Banville is queuing up to interview you?
Posted by: Andrew | December 07, 2007 at 02:44 PM
Outstanding news! Canongate is cool personified. Watching from here with great interest, Mark.
Posted by: David | December 08, 2007 at 05:23 AM
Congratulations on this great news! Look forward to reading the book...and raving.
You mention Jamie Byng. I had the pleasure of interviewing him last year at BookExpo. Here's a brief summary of what we talked about, and a link to listen, if there is an interest:
Jamie Byng appreciates and understands that myth and The Bible lie at the core of creative imagination and the Western Canon. He marries this knowledge with a skill for presentation and promotion that few other publishers can match.We talk here about how he does it, about ambiguity, about the responsibility we parents have to make the lives of our children interesting if not easy, and about living without fear.
http://nigelbeale.com/?p=288
Posted by: Nigel Beale | December 08, 2007 at 07:56 PM
Congratulations! I’ll read your book in Italian. Could you kindly tell me the name of the Italian publisher? Thank you, I’m curious!
Posted by: Annarita | December 09, 2007 at 05:51 AM
Well done Mark, Canongate are one of my favourite publishers.
Posted by: Sinead | December 09, 2007 at 11:36 AM
Oh my gosh, wow, congratulations! The first line of your last paragraph -- huge understatement!
Posted by: Tonya | December 09, 2007 at 11:42 AM
Thank you, everyone, for the kind wishes. Annarita, we haven't settled on an Italian publisher yet, but I'll be sure to announce that when we do.
Posted by: TEV | December 09, 2007 at 12:17 PM
Good work my friend. Will you be accepting applications for sycophants and hangers-on soon?
C-
Posted by: C- | December 10, 2007 at 02:15 AM
Congratulations, Mark! You've made it to gawker.com, too which means you truly have arrived! ;-0
Posted by: Sabra | December 10, 2007 at 06:23 PM
Great news, Mark. Jump high, make a big splash.
Posted by: stephan | December 11, 2007 at 09:21 AM
Long time reader is very happy for you.
Posted by: MJ | December 17, 2007 at 01:23 PM