I am
absolutely thrilled that Publishers Weekly today announced that Alice
Jerman at Harper Collins Children’s Books has bought two Young Adult novels
from me, with first refusal on a third. All three novels will be historical
fiction, and the first – WAIT FOR ME - will be published in the USA in early
2017.
Here’s
the full version of official announcement made today in Publishers Weekly.
WAIT FOR ME is set on a farm in eastern Scotland in the closing months of World War Two just as Paul, an injured German prisoner-of-war, is sent to the farm to work. Lorna, the farmer’s teenage daughter, soon discovers that in wartime, your family and your allies might not actually be your friends, and your enemy might turn out to be the love of your life. Lorna’s friendship with Paul, and their developing love for each other, is challenged by Lorna’s own prejudices and by the intolerance of her soldier brother and her friends in the village. Ultimately, will the events which bring peace to Europe tear Lorna and Paul apart?
WAIT FOR ME is set on a farm in eastern Scotland in the closing months of World War Two just as Paul, an injured German prisoner-of-war, is sent to the farm to work. Lorna, the farmer’s teenage daughter, soon discovers that in wartime, your family and your allies might not actually be your friends, and your enemy might turn out to be the love of your life. Lorna’s friendship with Paul, and their developing love for each other, is challenged by Lorna’s own prejudices and by the intolerance of her soldier brother and her friends in the village. Ultimately, will the events which bring peace to Europe tear Lorna and Paul apart?
The
second book, as yet untitled, is planned for publication in 2018.
This
story started out as a NaNoWriMo book in 2010 – that is, I wrote the first
50,000 words of it in just one month as part of National Novel Writing Month
(yes, that’s 1,663 every day!). How appropriate then that the
announcement that WAIT FOR ME is headed for bookshelves and e-readers comes
during November, the month for NaNoWriMo 2015.
I am
currently revising the WAIT FOR ME manuscript, under Alice’s insightful and
intelligent direction, and it’s just staggering to think that in a little over
a year, you might be reading the words that I have been writing/rewriting/playing
with/deleting/adding in again this morning.
Thank
you, Alice, for your enthusiasm and kindness.
And I
also send enormous thanks to my spectacular agents, Danielle Barthel and Suzie
Townsend at New Leaf Literary & Media Inc., for guiding me into and around
the first turn in the maze that is the publishing industry. I think we might
have some fun with this!
I’d love
to keep you in touch with developments in the life of WAIT FOR ME and my other
books, so if you’d like to follow this blog, use the Follow box to the right of
this page, or I’d love to hear from you via the Contact box that’s over there
too.
Pleae
LIKE my Caroline
Leech Author page on Facebook…
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me @carolinesblurb on Twitter…
I’d love
to have you along with me for the ride. #excitingday
Caroline
