We’re delighted that Allegra Le Fanu at Bloomsbury Publishing has acquired UK and Commonwealth rights (excluding Canada) to Tom Benn's new novel OXBLOOD from Isobel Dixon.
OXBLOOD is the story of three seething generations of forgotten mothers living together in mid-1980s’ Wythenshawe, south Manchester. The family’s dead patriarchs once ruled Manchester’s underworld; now their house harbours an unregistered baby and is haunted by the ghost of a murdered man. The only surviving man in the family has returned home from prison – and in the course of a few days Nedra, Carol and Jan must all confront their family’s bitter legacy if they are to exorcise its past.
Tom Benn’s first novel, THE DOLL PRINCESS, was shortlisted for the Dylan Thomas Prize and the Portico Prize and longlisted for the CWA’s John Creasey Dagger. Benn’s creative nonfiction has appeared in the Paris Review and he won the BFI’s iWrite scheme for emerging screenwriters. His first film Real Gods Require Blood premiered in competition at the Cannes Film Festival and was nominated for Best Short Film at the BFI London Film Festival. Originally from Stockport, he teaches on the UEA Crime Fiction Creative Writing MA and lives in Norwich.
Allegra Le Fanu said: ‘I can't wait for the world to meet Nedra, Carol and Jan, the three generations of women who blaze on the pages of Tom Benn's extraordinary OXBLOOD. My heart was captured by this daring, exhilarating, miraculous book from the very first page.'
Tom Benn said: ‘OXBLOOD was seven years in the writing, and so it's good to know that a Manchester novel about horny ghosts and forgotten Wythenshawe nanas can find a home. I’m overwhelmed by the enthusiasm of Allegra and the Bloomsbury team: so welcoming of working-class stories. And I’m indebted to my agent, Isobel Dixon, for her absolute belief in the book.’
Isobel Dixon said: ‘OXBLOOD is a novel of such rare, arresting immediacy and haunting power – I’m so delighted that Allegra Le Fanu heard the fierce and tender voices of these women, and of the world they inhabit, and that Tom Benn has found such an excellent home and editor at Bloomsbury.’
Publication is planned for April 2022, backed by a major marketing and publicity campaign.
About Tom Benn:
Tom Benn is an author, screenwriter and lecturer from Stockport, England. His first novel, THE DOLL PRINCESS (Cape), was shortlisted for the Dylan Thomas Prize and the Portico Prize, longlisted for the CWA’s John Creasey Dagger, and was The Daily Mirror's Book of the Week. His other novels are CHAMBER MUSIC (Cape) and TROUBLE MAN (Cape). He won runner-up prize in the 2019 International Desperate Literature Prize for Short Fiction, and his creative nonfiction has appeared in The Paris Review Daily. He won the BFI’s iWrite scheme for emerging screenwriters. His first film, 'Real Gods Require Blood', premiered in competition at the Cannes Film Festival, and was nominated for Best Short Film at the BFI London Film Festival.