Two-book deal with Harper Collins Children's Books

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?

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.

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I’d love to have you along with me for the ride. #excitingday

Caroline