Monique Roffey at the Hong Kong Literary Festival

Monique Roffey, author of the Bocas Prizewinning novel ARCHIPELAGO, will be at the Hong Kong Literary Festival, which takes place from the 1st to the 10th November. Featured guests this year include Jung Chang, author of WHITE SWANS, Guo Xiaolu, one of Granta’s Best of Young British Novelists 2014, and Graeme Simsion, author of THE ROSIE PROJECT.

The Hong Kong International Literary Festival celebrates creative writing in English and emphasises writing with an Asian connection. The Festival features both established and emerging authors and includes works in translation, literary fiction and non-fiction, poetry and scriptwriting. 

Monique Roffey will be talking at a panel discussion at the Kee Club, Nov 2, 4.30pm-6pm, as well as her own event at the Fringe Club, Nov 2, 6pm-7pm.

For more information visit The Hong Literary Festival website.

Manu Joseph Longlisted for the DSC Prize for South Asian Literature

Manu Joseph’s second novel THE ILLICIT HAPPINESS OF OTHER PEOPLE has been Longlisted for the DSC Prize for South Asian Literature 2013. This $50,000 prize has previously been won by M Naqvi for Home Boy, by Shehan Karunatilaka for Chinaman: The Legend of Pradeep Mathew and by Jeet Thayil for Narcopolis.

Others on the longlist include Joydeep Roy-Bhattacharya, Philip Hensher, Mohsin Hamid and Nadeem Aslam.  The shortlist for the DSC Prize will be revealed on Wednesday, November 20, 2013 at The London School of Economics in London. The winner will be announced at the DSC Jaipur Literature Festival in January 2014.

Set in Madras in the 1990s, where every adolescent male is preparing for the toughest exam in the world, THE ILLICIT HAPPINESS OF OTHER PEOPLE is a powerful and darkly comic story involving an alcoholic's probe into the minds of the sober, an adolescent cartoonist's dangerous interpretation of absolute truth, an inner circle of talented schizophrenics and the pure love of a 12-year-old boy for a beautiful girl.

THE ILLICIT HAPPINESS OF OTHER PEOPLE is published by John Murray in the UK, Norton in the US and HarperCollins in Canada and India. Earlier this year it was a Top Ten bestseller in Holland, where Podium publish, and it has just been released as a lead title for C.H.Beck in Germany.

Manu Joseph’s first novel, SERIOUS PEOPLE, won the Hindu Best Fiction award, and was shortlisted for various prizes including Man Asian Literary Prize and the Bollinger Everyman Wodehouse Prize.

In November he will be in Belgium, with events including a Public interview in Leuven on 26 November and a Reading Club in Passa Porta on 28 November.

Praise for Manu Joseph:

'Manu Joseph really is a fine storyteller. His narrative is rich with detail.' - Antara Dev Sen, The Asian Age

'Manu Joseph is brilliant' - Tom Sutcliffe, BBC Radio 4

'A searing new voice.' --  Megan O'Grady, Vogue

Praise for THE ILLICIT HAPPINESS OF OTHER PEOPLE:

'A cocktail of character, culture and religion … exquisitely phrased without an excess of sentimentality.' -- The Daily Telegraph

'Tense and intriguing … [with] striking observations… THE ILLICIT HAPPINESS OF OTHER PEOPLE is an engaging read that leaves readers with plenty to think about afterwards.' -- David Hebblethwaite, We Love This Book

'Both wittily funny and darkly serious.' -- Harry Ritchie, Daily Mail

Lizzie Bates and Anna Emerson head to New York TV Festival

Our screenwriting clients, Lizzie Bates and Anna Emerson, are heading to New York, having been selected by BAFTA and Rocliffe to showcase their work at the television festival there. The pair co-write, and are two thirds of sketch comedy group The Boom Jennies.

At the New York Television Festival, Anna and Lizzie will have some of their work performed by actors at the BAFTA Rocliffe New Writing Forum, chaired by Greg Daniels (showrunner of The Office and co-creator of Parks & Recreation).

You can read more about the event here - we're very happy for them both and hope they have a fantastic trip!

Voting begins for Kerry Hudson to win Scottish Book Awards

Voting has commenced for the overall winner of the Scottish Book Awards 2013. TONY HOGAN BOUGHT ME AN ICE CREAM FLOAT BEFORE HE STOLE MY MA by Blake Friedmann author Kerry Hudson has won the First Book award at the Scottish Mortgage Development Trust Book Awards 2013, and is therefore eligible for the overall prize of £20,000.

The winner will be announced on Saturday 2nd November at the Lennoxlove Book Festival. The other finalists are Ewan Morrison in the fiction category, Gavin Francis in the non-fiction category and Richard Price in the poetry category.

Please vote for Kerry to win here!

TONY HOGAN... was published in July 2012 by Chatto & Windus and has been shortlisted for eight literary prizes so far, including the Guardian First Book Award. Kerry's second novel, THIRST, will be published by Chatto in July 2014.

Praise for TONY HOGAN...:

'What a brilliant thing to turn the chaos and trauma of a hectic childhood into a debut novel as colourful, funny, joyful and compelling as this.'
- The Guardian

'This is a remarkable debut novel of love and loyalty, of fierce passion and scabrous wit.'
- Foyles

'From the (unrepeatable) hilarious first sentence, this debut sucks you in with its idiosyncratic style... Kerry Hudson's writing is very funny, and her deft touches give the book a reality that makes it all the more powerful. Hudson certainly has a bright future.'
- We Love This Book

KNIGHTLEY & SON selected for New Voices

KNIGHTLEY & SON by Rohan Gavin will be a part of the Spring 2014 Indies Introduce New Voices promotion.   This scheme was initiated by the American Booksellers Association, made up of independent bookstores across the US.   Titles selected will be featured in a two-page spread in the ABC Best Books for Children Catalogue.  The entire list of Spring Picks is featured with bookseller quotes on IndieBound.org.

Rohan Gavin is a screenwriter and debut novelist. KNIGHTLEY & SON, the story of a father-and-son detective duo, will be published by Bloomsbury UK on 2 January 2014 and Bloomsbury US in April 2014. French rights are sold to Gallimard.