FICTION Fall 2019
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Fall 08 LESTER LITERARY AGENCY & ASSOCIATES FICTION Fall 2019 Eastern Europe Central Europe Baltic countries HIGHLIGHTS HIGHLIGHTS ................................................................................. 3 DEBUT NOVEL / NEW VOICES ................................................. 8 UP-MARKET ................................................................................ 11 CONTEMPORARY ...................................................................... 14 COMMERCIAL .............................................................................. 17 ROMANCE / EROTICA .............................................................. 24 FEEL GOOD .................................................................................. 25 BIO & HISTORICAL .................................................................... 29 THRILLER ..................................................................................... 35 CRIME / NOIR .............................................................................. 42 ITALIAN WRITERS .................................................................... 45 FRENCH CANADIAN WRITERS .............................................. 46 FOCUS ON… ................................................................................ 47 DYSTOPIA / FANTASY / SF ..................................................... 51 (RE)DISCOVERED WRITERS .................................................... 53 2 Lester Literary Agency & Associates / Fall 2019 / Fiction Catalogue / Central, Eastern Europe & Baltic countries HIGHLIGHTS Thomas Gunzig Jean-Baptiste Andrea FEEL GOOD CENT MILLIONS D’ANNÉES ET UN JOUR (Feel Good) (A Hundred Million Years and a Day) Diable Vauvert, August 2019, 350 pages L'Iconoclaste, August 2019, 320 pages ◊ 8,000 copies sold only one week after release. ◊ Full English translation by Sam Taylor available. ◊ A metafictional novel in which black humour and ◊ Rights sold in: Italy (Stile Libero), Germany fatalism rub shoulders with a lust for life and (Luctherhand/Btb), UK/US (Gallic books). unfailing hope. ◊ 5th favorite novel of booksellers in the “Livres ◊ Alternating between hilarious passages on the Hebdo” ranking. literary phenomenon of the moment and lucid descriptions of his time, with great intelligence, ◊ A gripping page-turner where the passionate Gunzig manages to entwine his novel with that of pursuit of an impossible dream leads to bitter his heroine to better poke fun at literature and disappointment and madness. depict his era. ◊ A poetic, mineral style that paints a portrait of the ◊ Hilarious passages about both a current literary enchanting and terrifying Dolomite landscape in phenomenon (the feel-good novel) and the small, delicate strokes. publishing world in general, rigid with absurd ◊ A novel with a powerful narrative voice, literary prizes, book fairs and rivalries, and its reverberating with echoes of tales from the hierarchy between the “real” authors and the mountains and the legendary, perilous climbs of disdained ones. Both absolutely universal and Irvine and Mallory, Maurice Herzog, and others. thoroughly enjoyable. ◊ Stan’s past, which comes out over the course of After the success of LA VIE SAUVAGE, this Belgian the novel, allows readers to grasp his complicated author’s latest novel, a cross between realism and satire, psychology: a lonely childhood in the Pyrénées, his offers an impressively clear-eyed view of today’s world. mother’s death, the humiliation his father and schoolmates subjected him to. Alice, a shoe shop sales assistant, has always been A novel about a scientific quest, and a story about going economically insecure. But she can't take having to count back to nature, experiencing cold, physical effort, and every penny and not being able to provide a better life for her son anymore. A crazy idea thus starts to form: kidnap a solitude; as well as a voyage through both madness and rich kid from a wealthy nursery and demand a ransom. childhood. Unfortunately, nothing goes according to plan and she soon finds herself with a baby that nobody wants to claim on her At the decline of his career, Stanislas Armengol, a French hands. Tom, a middling author, bumps into Alice one day paleontologist, sets off on his last crazy adventure as he and her kidnapping story gives him an idea: he suggests attempts to locate a fully preserved skeleton of a making a novel out of it and sharing the profits. Brontosaurus in the Alps in the company of Umberto, an old colleague. Arduous and extremely dangerous, this Alice, unconvinced, makes him a counteroffer: under his expedition will revive some of Stanislas’ oldest fears and tutelage, she will write a “feel good book”, following the weaknesses before turning into a deathly struggle between popular style of today, a bestseller likely to sell hundreds of man and nature. A hallucinatory climb toward the heights of thousands of copies and take her off the poverty line once madness and dreams. and for all ... Following the success of My Queen, this second novel ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Thomas Gunzig was born in Brussels provides confirmation of a prodigious talent. in 1970. He is the author of several collections of short-stories acclaimed by the critic. MORT D’UN PARFAIT BILINGUE won ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Jean-Baptiste Andrea was a movie the 2001 Prix Rossel in Belgium. LE PLUS PETIT ZOO DU director and screenwriter. Then he wrote MA REINE (22,000 MONDE (rights sold in China and Bulgaria) followed by KURU, copies sold, winner of 12 prizes including the Prix du Premier (finalist in the Prix de Flore, 2005). LA VIE SAUVAGE (2017 sold Roman and the Prix Femina des Lycéens, 9 foreign licenses), 10.000 copies). and !for two years he traveled to!more than 50 cities, in France !and abroad, meeting readers, booksellers and librarians. Now he is “It is funny, spirited with a scathing irony on the book publishing leaving behind the cinema for literature. industry.” Voici 3 HIGHLIGHTS Cécile Coulon Sophie Bassignac UNE BÊTE AU PARADIS LE PLUS FOU DES DEUX (A Beast in Paradise) (The Craziest Amongst Both of Them) L'Iconoclaste, August 2019, 352 pages JC Lattès, August 2019, 240 pages ◊ Rights sold in: Israel (U Sifrut She’nogaat), Italy ◊ An interesting exploration of the world of (E/O), Greece. puppetry making. ◊ Awarded the Prix littéraire du Monde 2019. ◊ An encounter that will reconcile Lucie with a painful past. ◊ Long-listed for the Prix Intérallié 2019 and the Grand Prix du roman de l’Académie française. ◊ Illusion, betrayal, humiliation and a thirst for revenge are at the heart of this darkly exhilarating ◊ The story of women from an all-female lineage novel that paints the portrait of an artist caught up who sacrifice everything for the land they pass in passion and quickly overcome. down from mother to daughter. Famous puppeteer, Lucie Paugham thus makes the ◊ Intense, relentless suspense masterfully conducted mistake of letting a complete stranger into her life, by Cécile Coulon, who draws the reader into a nerve-wracking huis clos despite the risk of losing everything she has accomplished. ◊ Blanche, a fascinating character: hyper-sensitive and capable of absolute, murderous love “Someone told me once that you should never force those A love triangle set in the French countryside where the who wish to die to stay alive.They will make you pay for reader will enjoy Coulon's usual skill with words and the your stubbornness.” beautifully earthy descriptions of nature and the countryside. What do you say to a stranger who dares you to stop him from committing suicide on New Year’s Eve? Well, of course you say that you will try to help him to change his When Blanche's high-school boyfriend Alexandre returns to mind.Especially if, by chance or by destiny, you were their village after ten years in the city, Blanche's past feelings confronted by the same request thirty years earlier by your resurge. But Louis, the farmhand who has always had own father… (unrequited) feelings for Blanche, is determined to keep Alexandre as far away from her as he can. A story about ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Sophie Bassignac is the author of generational change, the city encroaching upon the several acclaimed novels with JC Lattès; among which, MER countryside. A love story, consuming love, love of nature, AGITÉE À TRÈS AGITÉE (2014), SÉDUIRE ISABELLE A.(2016) love of each other, and also of course lust and desire. and LA DISTANCE DE COURTOISIE (2018). LE PLUS FOU DES DEUX is her ninth novel. ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Since her first book, written! at seventeen years old, Cécile Coulon never ceases to surprise and « Pétri d’intelligence, riche de réflexions à graver dans le marbre amaze us. In just a few years, she has produced six novels, (sur l’époque, le bonheur, la beauté, la création, le désir, l’humour, la including TROIS SAISONS D’ORAGE, winner of the Prix des mémoire), Le plus fous des deux est le plus abouti des livres de libraires, and a collection of poems (Prix Apollinaire 2017). Sophie Bassignac. », L’express « Un feel good book ? Et pourquoi pas. Celui-ci n’a rien de mièvre. C’est là tout le charme des portraits de femmes compose, depuis ses débuts, Sophie Bassignac». Le monde 4 Lester Literary Agency & Associates / Fall 2019 / Fiction Catalogue / Central, Eastern Europe & Baltic countries Yannick Grannec Alexis Ragougneau LES SIMPLES OPUS 77 (The Simples) (Opus 77) Anne Carrière, August 2019, 368 pages Viviane Hamy, September 2019, 256 pages ◊ Under option in: Czech Republic (Argo). ◊ Rights sold in: Spain (Alianza). ◊ Set on the French Riviera in the