Acclaimed series RECIPES FOR LOVE AND MURDER shortlisted for a Rose D'or

We are delighted that the television adaptation of Sally Andrew’s beloved Tannie Maria series, RECIPES FOR LOVE AND MURDER, has been shortlisted in the Comedy Drama and Sitcom category at the Rose d’Or Awards. Established in 1961, the prestigious Rose d’Or Awards celebrate excellence and achievement in International TV and Audio programme making. The nominees for Rose d’Or 2022 will be announced at the start of November, ahead of the Awards which will be presented on November 28th.

Originally broadcast in South Africa on M-Net, RECIPES FOR LOVE AND MURDER is available for streaming on Acorn TV in the UK, Australia and New Zealand, United States, Canada and Latin America. The engaging 10-part series can also be watched on Acorn via Amazon Prime.

Irish actor Maria Doyle Kennedy, whose credits include OUTLANDER and THE TUDORS, stars as series heroine Tannie Maria alongside Tony Kgoroge (INVICTUS), and newcomer Kylie Fisher. See Maria Doyle Kennedy talking about preparing for her role (filming in South Africa, but with a Scottish accent – and with a chicken co-star too!) here.

The series has already received glowing reviews. Christopher Vourlias describes it as ‘a quirky, colourful murder mystery’ and his Variety  piece includes an interview with producer Thierry Cassuto. Roslyn Sulcas praised it in The New York Times writing: ‘The TV series offers the same mix of human drama, gorgeous landscape, local colour and mouth-watering cooking, quietly threaded through with the more serious issues of domestic abuse, racial inequality and the legacies of apartheid… Despite the murders and simmering racial undertones, the show keeps its warm, humorous tone through the quiet, grounded character of Maria, with her empathetic, practical advice – and recipes – in response to the letters she receives.’

Based on the bestselling series debut by Sally Andrew, RECIPES FOR LOVE AND MURDER follows Tannie Maria, a South African advice and food columnist, who finds herself caught up in the death of the husband of one of her correspondents.

What to Watch reviewer Ian MacEwan called the series ‘an unusual mix of food porn and murder mystery, in which cook turned agony Tannie (‘auntie’ in Afrikaans) Maria (Maria Doyle Kennedy) solves crimes, in between sharing her mouth-watering culinary creations.’ You can watch many of the recipes, which also feature in the novels, being prepared step by step onscreen!

As an example, you can catch a glimpse of an episode here – and watch out for Morag’s entrance!

 Filmed in South Africa and Scotland, the series is a co-production between M-Net, AMC Networks’ Acorn TV, and Both Worlds Pictures, in co-operation with Global Screen. Thierry Cassuto, who founded the International Emmy-nominated Cape Town-based Both Worlds Pictures, produced the series in collaboration with Scotland’s Pirate Productions, with development support provided by Creative Scotland, and Paris-based Paradoxal.

The show was adapted for TV by Karen Jeynes, who is also executive producer, along with Scotland-based writer-director Annie Griffin. The series was directed by Christiaan Olwagen and Karen Jeynes.

The full Tannie Maria book series – RECIPES FOR LOVE AND MURDER, THE SATANIC MECHANIC, DEATH ON THE LIMPOPO and THE MILK TART MURDERS – is published by Umuzi (Penguin Random House SA) in South Africa, and the first two books are available from Canongate in the UK and Ecco Press in the US among others – with more news to follow. The Tannie Maria series titles are all bestsellers in South Africa – regularly in the Top 5, with the fourth book, THE MILK TART MURDERS, shooting straight to the top of the combined fiction and non-fiction charts on publication in March 2022.

See here for a letter to Tannie Maria asking for advice, along with Tannie Maria’s response, excerpted from RECIPES FOR LOVE AND MURDER – along with a lamb curry recipe.

And you can watch Sally Andrew herself talking about the film adaptation, the script, some of its characters and stars and what’s she learned from Tannie Maria here. 



About Sally Andrew

Sally Andrew divides her time between the Cape Town coast and a nature reserve near the small town of Ladismith in the Klein Karoo, South Africa, the setting of her hugely popular Tannie Maria novels. She lives with her wildlife artist partner, among various wild creatures (including, as she says, ‘a giant eland and a secretive leopard’). Sally has also published a number of non-fiction books on adult and environmental education.



Praise for RECIPES FOR LOVE AND MURDER TV show

‘The TV series offers the same mix of human drama, gorgeous landscape, local colour and mouth-watering cooking, quietly threaded through with the more serious issues of domestic abuse, racial inequality and the legacies of apartheid… Despite the murders and simmering racial undertones, the show keeps its warm, humorous tone through the quiet, grounded character of Maria, with her empathetic, practical advice – and recipes – in response to the letters she receives.’ – Roslyn Sulcas, The New York Times

 ‘A quirky, colourful murder mystery set in the South African outback.’ – Christopher Vourlias, Variety

 ‘The highly watchable Maria Doyle Kennedy takes the lead in this very fun and quirky crime series, which is based on the book of the same name by Sally Andrew. Tannie Maria (Doyle Kennedy) is a recipe-creator-turned-advice-columnist who gets caught up in a murder mystery based on one of the letters she receives for her column. Teaming up with an investigative journalist to get to the bottom of the case, the pair clash with local police as they run amok across crime scenes.’ – Jenna Guillaume, Flicks, ‘7 TV shows arriving in September that we’re excited for’

 

Visit Sally’s website.

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Lyndall Gordon on T.S. Eliot in new book THE HYACINTH GIRL and The Waste Land documentary

Last week Lyndall Gordon’s THE HYACINTH GIRL: T.S. Eliot’s Hidden Muse was published by Virago in the UK in a beautiful hardback edition. Norton will publish in the US in November 2022. Colm Tóibín has hailed it as ‘brilliant … a rare work of sympathy and insight’ and Pulitzer finalist and Sylvia Plath biographer Heather Clark called it a ‘brilliant and revelatory work from one of our greatest biographers’, adding that ‘there is no finer guide into the mind of T.S. Eliot than Lyndall Gordon.’

This week Lyndall Gordon also appears in a new documentary about Eliot’s The Waste Land, which forms part of programming across BBC television and radio designed to celebrate the centenary of the publication of Eliot’s great long poem, The Waste Land. Directed by Susanna White, ‘T.S. Eliot – Into The Waste Land’, uncovers for the first time the hidden personal story behind Eliot’s creation of his celebrated poem. The documentary airs on BBC2 on Thursday 13th October at 9pm and is an Oxford Films production for the BBC, commissioned by BBC Arts Editor Mark Bell and produced by Rosie Alison and executive producer Nick Kent. You can watch the documentary here: www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m001d1yy/ts-eliot-into-the-waste-land

Along with Lyndall’s illuminating insights, there are contributions from actor and director Fiona Shaw and composer Max Richter; poets Hannah Sullivan and Daljit Nagra; Vivien Eliot's biographer Ann Pasternak Slater and Faber Poetry Editor Matthew Hollis, among others. Simon Russell Beale performs specially recorded readings of the poem, in conjunction with Eliot's own reading of his work. Moving through all five sections of the poem, the documentary explores many different facets of The Waste Land, from Eliot's state of mind during each phase, to the different places where it was composed.

Jahan Ramazani, author of POETRY IN A GOLDEN AGE wrote this of Lyndall’s work: ‘Beautifully written, fiercely honest, THE HYACINTH GIRL permanently dissolves the myth of impersonality, fathoming the vexed, tormented emotional life behind Eliot’s work.’

Among the greatest of poets, T. S. Eliot protected his privacy while publicly associated with three women: two wives and a church-going companion. At the same time he concealed a life-long love for a fourth woman, Emily Hale, a drama teacher to whom he wrote (and later suppressed) over a thousand letters. Hale was the source of ‘memory and desire’ in The Waste Land – as Lyndall writes, she is ‘the Hyacinth Girl’, in the memorable phrase from Eliot’s work.

Drawing on the dramatic new material of the recently unsealed 1,131 letters Eliot wrote to Hale, Lyndall Gordon reveals a hidden Eliot. In The Telegraph, Frances Wilson speaks of Lyndall Gordon’s ‘subtle readings’ and ‘customary care and delicacy’ in sifting through the documents and ‘tracing Hale’s influence throughout Eliot’s poetry’. In THE HYACINTH GIRL, Emily Hale is shown to be a quiet yet vital force, a consistently important woman in Eliot’s life – and his art. Gordon also offers new insight into the other spirited women who shaped him: Vivienne, the flamboyant wife with whom he shared a private wasteland; Mary Trevelyan, his companion in prayer; and Valerie Fletcher, the young disciple to whom he proposed when his relationship with Emily foundered, and with whom he lived happily till his death. Eliot kept these women in his life very separate, as each ignited his transformations as poet, expatriate, convert, and, finally, in his latter years, a man `made for love’.

Listen to Lyndall Gordon talking about The Waste Land on Woman’s Hour (at 46 minutes) in September, and Susanna White talking about the BBC documentary on the Today programme (at 2 hours 55 minutes).

Further Praise for THE HYACINTH GIRL

‘The true nature of T. S. Eliot's love for his American muse, Emily Hale, has been nearly wholly hidden until now.  In THE HYACINTH GIRL, Lyndall Gordon paints an astute portrait of Eliot as a man trapped between desire and propriety, between a past history of emotional damage and a seemingly impossible future of romantic contentment. Gordon illuminates Eliot's writing through the prism of his correspondence with Hale, demonstrating how central she is to a real understanding of the man and his work. A revelatory book.’ – Erica Wagner, author MARY AND MR ELIOT

'An illuminating account' – Publishers Weekly

‘There is no finer guide into the mind of T.S. Eliot than Lyndall Gordon... Thanks to Gordon’s meticulous research and inspired storytelling, we will never read these poems the same way again… Emily Hale, too, finally gets her due in this brilliant and revelatory work from one of our greatest biographers.’ – Heather Clark, author of the Pulitzer Prize finalist RED COMET: THE SHORT LIFE AND BLAZING ART OF SYLVIA PLATH

‘Extraordinary… THE HYACINTH GIRL is a rare work of sympathy and insight. Lyndall Gordon's passionately intelligent engagement with the letters between T.S. Eliot and Emily Hale is matched by her close reading of Eliot's poems. Her ability to see both complexity and simplicity in the relationship between Eliot and Hale means that their entangled world comes fully alive in this brilliant book.’ – Colm Tóibín, author of THE MAGICIAN

‘Gordon sifts through the remaining documents with her customary care and delicacy … tracing Hale’s influence throughout the poetry, aware that her interpretations of character are based on one side of a correspondence… Gordon’s subtle readings never lose sight of the central mystery: why did Hale stay in a relationship that offered no future? The answer is that the letters had become her life, and it was as evidence of that that she chose to save them.’ – Frances Wilson, The Telegraph

‘Often in biography the supporting cast is forgotten once the author’s gaze moves on and women can be ignored in favour of the men who play more traditional roles. This is not the case with THE HYACINTH GIRL … Gordon, in her tracing of Hale’s life to its end – she never married and pursued a career as a teacher, actor and director – reminds us that she lived her own life, made her own choices and ‘would not want our pity’. She may have been Eliot’s Hyacinth girl but she was considerably more.  These books don’t undermine Eliot’s life or his achievement. Instead, they set him in a wider context, connecting him to the women who contributed so much to his success and paid a high price for doing so.’ – Tom Williams, The Spectator

‘An indispensable study that will inspire new perspectives on Eliot’s life and work for generations to come.’ – Anita Patterson, Professor of English, Boston University

‘THE HYACINTH GIRL is an elegant meditation on the women whose lives were fundamental to the life of T. S. Eliot. Lyndall Gordon has given us the fullest account yet of Eliot’s strained and distant relationship with his onetime sweetheart Emily Hale… Together with her account of Eliot’s subsequent marriage to Valerie Fletcher, who had been his secretary, these give a painfully intimate look at the poet, one that also results in significant reassessments of his most imposing poems.’ – Michael North, Professor of English, University of California, and editor of the NORTON CRITICAL EDITION OF THE WASTE LAND AND OTHER POEMS

‘Like an unopened Egyptian tomb, a trove of TS Eliot’s letters has lurked for decades in the Princeton Library. Lyndall Gordon has now cracked it open, and in THE HYACINTH GIRL reveals a treasure of new insights into this most emblematic modern poet. If you thought you knew Eliot, think again.’ – Benjamin Moser, Pulitzer Prize–winning author of SONTAG: HER LIFE AND WORK 

‘In an engrossing study of art refracting life, Lyndall Gordon explores the conflicted emotions that Eliot translated into his ostensibly impersonal art.’ – Leo Damrosch, author of ADVENTURER: THE LIFE AND TIMES OF GIACOMO CASANOVA

About Lyndall Gordon

A much-celebrated biographer, Lyndall Gordon lives in Oxford. Her ability to make the subjects of her biographies come vividly to life has won her many literary awards, including the Cheltenham Prize and the James Tait Black prize. She has also been longlisted for the Samuel Johnson Prize and shortlisted for the Duff Cooper Prize and the Comisso Prize in Italy for her Emily Dickinson biography LIVE LIKE LOADED GUNS.

Her previous biographical work on T.S. Eliot – two biographies, ELIOT’S EARLY YEARS and ELIOT’S NEW LIFE, incorporated into an updated edition, THE IMPERFECT LIFE OF T.S. ELIOT – won the British Academy's Rose Mary Crawshay Prize and Southern Arts prize. THE IMPERFECT LIFE OF T.S Eliot was also selected by the New York Public Library as one of 25 'Books to Remember' from 2000 and by the Independent on Sunday as one of the '30 best biographies of the twentieth century'. Translator Xu Xiaofan won the Lu Xun Literary Prize for her translation of THE IMPERFECT LIFE OF T.S. ELIOT, published in China by Shanghai Literature and Art.

Candia McWilliam calls Lyndall Gordon 'a rare phenomenon: a biographer whose preoccupations and authorial career reveal a flowering towards imaginative truth.' Brenda Maddox talks of her 'adventurous scholarship'.

Visit Lyndall Gordon’s website here. 

Transworld acquires debut thriller THE DIVE by Sara Ochs

Transworld Publishers has pre-empted THE DIVE, an unputdownable debut thriller from Sara Ochs, in a significant, six-figure deal.

Finn Cotton, Senior Commissioning Editor, bought UK and Commonwealth rights to THE DIVE and one untitled thriller from Kate Burke. US rights have been won at auction, also in a six-figure deal, and rights have already been sold in pre-empts or at auction in Germany, Holland and Finland. Due to publish in hardback, ebook and audio in May 2023, this will be a lead debut launch for Bantam, supported with a major marketing and publicity campaign.

Perfect for fans of THE BEACH and the TV show, The Serpent, as well as writers such as Ruth Ware and Lucy Foley, THE DIVE is set at a scuba diving school on one of Thailand’s world-famous party islands – a place where backpackers go to find themselves or get lost for ever. When a young woman is found dead during a scuba diving lesson, the morning after a full moon party, the diving instructor and her group of ex-pat friends realise they aren’t the only people who have fallen in love with paradise. A killer has too.

Finn Cotton said: ‘As soon as I began to read THE DIVE, Sara’s voice, the incredible opening chapters and the atmospheric writing took me on a journey to Thailand. I’ve always been fascinated by scuba diving and by the dangers associated with the sport, so I was immediately drawn to this escapist, suspenseful story. The whole Transworld team have fallen in love with this novel, and we couldn’t be happier that Sara has chosen us to be her publisher. We have big and ambitious plans for launching her writing career next year and look forward to getting this book into the hands of as many readers as possible around the world.’

Ochs said: ‘Becoming part of the Transworld team has been an absolute dream come true. Finn’s vision and the entire team’s enthusiasm for THE DIVE has made the editing process an amazing experience. I am so grateful for the work they and my agent, Kate Burke, have done to bring this book to life. I can’t wait for readers to escape to the dark paradise at the heart of THE DIVE!’

Burke said: ‘This was such an exciting submission with a flurry of swift activity and I’m delighted that it landed with Transworld on their incredible list. Sara is a star in the making!’

About Sara Ochs

Sara Ochs is an attorney, law professor, and author who splits her time between the United States and Sweden. When she’s not writing psychological thrillers set in far-flung destinations, Sara can usually be found on a flight with a glass of wine in one hand and a novel in the other.

Follow Sara on Twitter and Instagram.

Visit Sara’s website.

New bestseller PICTURE YOU DEAD by Peter James – ‘Picture perfect at peak’

Credit: Graham Franks Photography

PICTURE YOU DEAD by Peter James has flown to Number One in the Bookseller’s weekly ‘Bookstat E-Book Top 10’ and to Number Two in the Sunday Times hardback bestseller charts, after only three days on sale. ‘Picture perfect at peak for James’, the Bookseller reported, adding that ‘Peter James’s PICTURE YOU DEAD swiped the Bookstat e-book number one in a photo finish.’

The eighteenth instalment of the bestselling Detective Superintendent Roy Grace series is published by Pan Macmillan, who signed up 5 more series titles from Peter James last year.

PICTURE YOU DEAD was launched with a vigorous and inventive marketing and publicity campaign including a much-anticipated return to the traditional annual Roy Grace launch party – held again on Brighton pier after two years without an in-person celebration, and this time with ITV’s GRACE stars, John Simm and Richie Campbell, among the crowd.

Peter went on a whirlwind book signing tour across Sussex and beyond, visiting multiple independent bookshops, the Jersey Festival of Words, and Capital Crime Festival. He also embarked on an extensive regional radio tour. As well as the trade hardback, two exclusive editions of PICTURE YOU DEAD were also published: one with extra material exclusive to WH Smith, and a special edition for indie bookshops with beautiful sprayed edges.

In PICTURE YOU DEAD, Detective Superintendent Roy Grace finds himself plunged into an unfamiliar world of fine art – and art forgery. Outwardly the fine art scene appears respectable, refined, above reproach. But beneath the veneer, he rapidly finds that greed, deception and violence walk hand-in-hand.

Harry and Freya, an ordinary couple, dreamed for years of finding something priceless buried amongst the tat in a car boot sale. It was a dream they knew in their hearts would never come true – until the day it did… They buy a drab portrait for a few pounds, for its beautiful frame, planning to cut the painting out. Then studying it back at home there seems to be another picture beneath, of a stunning landscape. Could it be a long-lost masterpiece from 1770? If genuine, it could be worth millions. One collector is certain that the painting is genuine. Someone who will use any method he can to get what he wants and will stop at nothing.

And Harry and Freya are about to discover that their dream is turning into their worst nightmare…

Filming of the ITV series based on the Roy Grace novels continues in Brighton, with more of the thrilling stories to be broadcast in 2023. Peter is now writing the nineteenth instalment of the Roy Grace series which Pan Macmillan will publish next year.

Praise for Peter James:

‘Superior plotting and edge-of-the-seat suspense.’ – The Guardian

‘Peter James is one of the best crime writers in the business’ – Karin Slaughter

‘A master plotter who cunningly tunes into contemporary concerns. Peter James cannot fail to thrill.’  – Daily Mail

‘Memorable characters and nail-biting tension.’ –  Kathy Reichs

‘Peter James creates a world we can smell, touch and feel for his Brighton detective Inspector Roy Grace.’ – The Times

‘With echoes of Thomas Harris, the closer analogue is to Jeffrey Deaver’s clock-racing thrillers… James delivers the goods.’ — Kirkus Reviews

‘James just gets better and better and deserves the success he has achieved with this first-class series.’ — Independent on Sunday

About Peter James:

Peter James is the international bestselling author of many award-winning novels, repeatedly occupying the Number One slot on the Sunday Times bestseller charts in both hardback and paperback. Peter writes both thriller standalones and the hugely popular Brighton-set Roy Grace series, now adapted for ITV.

Peter’s books have been translated into thirty-eight languages, with worldwide sales of over twenty-one million copies and his Detective Superintendent Roy Grace series, set in Brighton, has given him 19 consecutive Sunday Times Number Ones. In 2015 WH Smith customers voted him the Greatest Crime Author of All Time and in 2016 he was awarded the coveted CWA Diamond Dagger, a lifetime achievement award for sustained excellence. In 2018 he received a Specsavers Honorary Platinum Bestseller Award. Peter James has also written two books based on true crime stories, with former senior detective Graham Bartlett.

The 16th Roy Grace, FIND THEM DEAD, was a UK Number 1 in both hardback and paperback, spending four consecutive weeks at Number 1 in paperback, and reaching Number 5 in Australia and Canada too. In 2021 Peter James repeated the hardback and paperback Top Ten double with LEFT YOU DEAD and standalone thriller I FOLLOW YOU.

Successful nationwide tours of the stage plays of THE PERFECT MURDER (2014), DEAD SIMPLE (2015,) NOT DEAD ENOUGH (2017) and THE HOUSE ON COLD HILL (2019) have packed theatres in dozens of British cities, and garnered magnificent reviews. The stage play of LOOKING GOOD DEAD toured the UK in 2021, and WISH YOU WERE DEAD will premiere in 2022. Several other Peter James novels are optioned for film and in further development.

Visit Peter’s website

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