SPRING 2023 HIGHLIGHTS

I Could Read the

Unbound c/o Runway East 20 St Thomas Street London SE1 9RS Tel. 020 3997 6790 www.unbound.com

@unbounders

Head of Sales

Julian Mash julian@unbound.com

Head of Rights

Ilona Chavasse ilona@unbound.com

Head of Communications

Rina Gill rina@unbound.com

To order any of the books in this catalogue please contact your PGUK rep. If you’re unsure who that is, contact Julian Mash at julian@unbound.com

Dear Reader,

Welcome to our autumn 2023 catalogue. Once again we have an incredible line up of books that we are very excited to be sharing with you.

Starting with 42: The Wildly Improbably Ideas of Douglas Adams which is hitting bookshops on 24 August and can, quite rightly, be described as a publishing event. When Douglas Adams died in 2001, he left behind 60 boxes full of notebooks, letters, scripts, jokes, speeches and even poems. In 42, compiled by Douglas’s long-time collaborator Kevin Jon Davies, hundreds of these personal artefacts appear in print for the very first time. Douglas was as much a thinker as he was a writer, and his artefacts reveal how his deep fascination with technology led to ideas which were far ahead of their time: a convention speech envisioning the modern smartphone, with all the information in the world living at our fingertips; sheets of notes predicting the advent of electronic books; journal entries from his forays into home computing, among others.

On the fiction side we have Jeremiah Bourne in Time, the first instalment of Nigel Planer’s historical fantasy trilogy releasing on 6 July. Jeremiah Bourne’s mother is a fugitive from the future, and her son, Jeremiah has inherited her ability to travel in time. In modern-day London, 18-year-old Jeremiah lives with his stepdad in a rambling house in Blackfriars. An innocent turn of an old biscuit tin propels Jeremiah into history, specifically into London Bridge in 1910 – the smoggy end of the Edwardian era. Jeremiah has two questions: how did he get there, and how can he get back? You can read an interview with Nigel on pages 6–10 where he discusses his research into Edwardian London and much more besides.

No Unbound season would be complete without a Jackie Morris title, and we are exceedingly pleased to be releasing The Unwinding Cards on 21 September. A collection of 100 postcards featuring artwork and words from Jackie’s best-selling ‘pillow book’, The Unwinding and Other Dreamings. The front of each card features one of Jackie’s paintings from the book; on the back, there is a short quote, spell or poem from the book plus space for you to write, draw or paint messages which you can send to spread peace and beauty to the people you love and care about.

6 July sees the publication of Under the Knife by Dr Liz O’Riordan, a breast cancer surgeon who has battled against social, physical and mental challenges to practise at the top of her field. Under the Knife charts Liz’s incredible highs: performing like a couture dressmaker as she moulded and reshaped women’s breasts, while saving their lives; to the heart-breaking lows of telling ten women a day that they had cancer. In addition to this high-powered, high-pressured role, Liz faced her own breast cancer diagnosis and by revealing how she coped when her life crashed around her, she demonstrates that there is always hope.

On 7 September we will publish Women Who Won, a celebration of 70 women from the last 100 years: politicians from around the globe who fought for election in a man’s world… and won. Beautifully illustrated by artist Emmy Lupin, it features well-known figures, including Kamala Harris, Benazir Bhutto, Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, Jacinda Ardern and Julia Gillard, alongside lesser-known women whose stories are ready to be heard.

Graham Harvey’s Underneath The Archers: My Life as an Undercover Agent for Nature hits bookshops on 24 August. Described as ‘hilarious, charming, eccentric, informative, addictive and delightful as the show itself’ by long-time Archers fan Stephen Fry, this is not to be missed. For more than three decades, scriptwriter Graham Harvey wrote over 600 episodes and crafted some of its most memorable moments such as the Great Flood and the trashing of Brian’s GM crop. In this book Graham interweaves personal memories of these moments with extracts from the scripts he created, offering behind-the-scenes details of how key characters and plot lines were developed.

Robert Elms Live! Why We Go Out is published on 19 October: a memoir of a life lived through live music from pub rock to jazz funk, punk to country and a musing on why music really matters. A truly special read that will have you scanning the live listings, inspired to get out and experience some live music as soon as you can!

These are just some of the highlights of one of our strongest seasons yet. It goes without saying that all of these titles and more are available to order from GBS or via your PGUK rep.

If you would like to put on an event or get a hold of a reading copy, please do drop me a line on julian@unbound.com and I will be happy to help.

Until next time, happy reading!

Julian Mash, Head of Sales