Latest news

Leading international literary agency Janklow & Nesbit (UK) Ltd are looking for a new Agency Assistant / Office Manager. This is a great opportunity for someone wanting to work across a range of genres supporting agents ? literary & commercial fiction and non-fiction ? so it would suit someone with diverse reading tastes. The job would also involve providing general office administrative support and liaising with publishers and authors, so the candidate should have a keen eye for detail and be confident working on a range of tasks, and would ideally have already spent time working for a literary agency or publisher. CV and covering letter to Rachel Balcombe rbalcombe@janklow.co.uk PLEASE NOTE THAT THIS VACANCY IS NOW CLOSED.

The seventh installment in MJ Arlidge's DI Helen Grace series, Love Me Not, has continued the success of previous books, entering the Sunday Times bestseller list at number four upon release. She Loves Me A woman?s body lies in the road. At first it looks like a tragic accident. But when Helen Grace arrives on the scene it?s clear she?s looking at a coldblooded killing. But why would anyone target a much loved wife and mother? She Loves Me Not Across town, a shopkeeper is killed while his customers are left unharmed. But what lies behind the killer?s choices? She Loves Me Who lives? Who dies? Who?s next? The clock is ticking. She Loves Me Not If Helen can?t solve this deadly puzzle then more blood will be shed. But any mistake and it might be her own? Love Me Not follows the successes of the rest of the series, maintaining an unbroken streak of top ten bestsellers. The first in the series, Eeny Meeny, was the biggest selling debut crime novel of 2014.

Low-level dishonesty is rife everywhere, in the form of exaggeration, selective use of facts, economy with the truth, careful drafting - from Trump and the Brexit debate to companies that tell us ?your call is important to us?. How did we get to a place where bullshit is not just rife but apparently so effective that it?s become the communications strategy of our times? Evan Davis' new book, Post Truth: Why We Have Reached Peak Bullshit and What We Can Do About It, explains all. This brilliantly insightful book steps inside the panoply of deception employed in all walks of life and assesses how it has come to this. It sets out the surprising logic which explains why bullshit is both pervasive and persistent. Why are company annual reports often nonsense? Why should you not trust estate agents? And above all, why has political campaigning become the art of stretching the truth? Drawing on behavioural science, economics, psychology and of course his knowledge of the media, Evan ends by providing readers with a tool-kit to handle the kinds of deceptions we encounter every day, and charts a route through the muddy waters of the post-truth age. The book has already received a plethora of excellent reviews. In the Guardian, John Gray called it "a rich and probing analysis of the use and misuse of the media", while in the Sunday Times, Roland White said "Davis's journey through the bullshit swamplands makes fascinating reading." In the Observer, Nick Cohen said of Post Truth "Evan Davis tackles bullshit by largely eschewing politics and producing a measured account of irrationality in economics. His care and his determination to make complicated ideas accessible show, above all, why he is such a good broadcaster."

"Ideas can and do change the world," says historian Rutger Bregman, sharing his case for a provocative one: guaranteed basic income. Learn more about the idea's 500-year history and a forgotten modern experiment where it actually worked ? and imagine how much energy and talent we would unleash if we got rid of poverty once and for all. Rutger Bregman's book, Utopia for Realists, shows that we can construct a society with visionary ideas that are, in fact, wholly implementable. Every milestone of civilization - from the end of slavery to the beginning of democracy - was once considered a utopian fantasy. New utopian ideas such as universal basic income and a 15-hour work week can become reality in our lifetime.

Edward Dusinberre has won the RPS Music Award 2017 for Creative Communication with his book Beethoven for a Later Age. The Royal Philharmonic Society Music Awards recognise outstanding musical achievement across the UK, with projects, artists and organisations from across the UK receiving accolades. Edward Dusinberre is first violinist of the world-renowned Tak?cs Quartet. Performances of Beethoven have shaped their work together for over forty years. In Beethoven for a Later Age, using the history of both the Tak?cs Quartet and the Beethoven quartets as the backbone to his story, Dusinberre recounts the exhilarating challenge of tackling these pieces. Beethoven for a Later Age takes the reader inside the daily life of a quartet, vividly showing the necessary creative tension between individual and group expression and how four people can enjoy making music together over a long period of time. The key, the author argues, is in balancing continuity with change and experimentation ? a theme that lies at the heart of Beethoven?s remarkable compositions. No other composer has posed so many questions about the form and emotional content of a string quartet, and come up with so many different answers. In an accessible style, suitable for novices and chamber music enthusiasts alike, Dusinberre illuminates the variety and inherent contradictions of Beethoven?s quartets, composed against the turbulent backdrop of the Napoleonic Wars and their aftermath, and shows that engaging with this radical music continues to be as invigorating now as it was for its first performers and audiences. BBC Radio 3 will present highlights from the awards. Click here to listen.

Kiran Millwood Hargrave's debut novel The Girl of Ink & Stars has won the British Book Awards Children's Book of the Year. Judges praised the poetic beauty of the novel and were impressed by the time and effort put into editorial and production for a debut author. The book beat strong competition including Tom Fletcher's The Christmasaurus, Harry Potter and the Cursed Child and David Walliams' The World's Worst Children. The British Book Awards, or Nibbies, is organised by The Bookseller and brings together books of the year with trade accolades in order to celebrate the whole journey from the author's mind to the reader's hand, and showcase the range and depth of modern publishing. Set at the start of the Golden Age of mapmaking, The Girl of Ink & Stars is a skilfully crafted middle-grade adventure novel inspired by the Canarian myth of Guayota and his demon-dogs. Forbidden to leave her island, Isabella dreams of the faraway lands her cartographer father once mapped. When her friend disappears, she volunteers to guide the search. The world beyond the walls is a monster-filled wasteland - and beneath the dry rivers and smoking mountains, a fire demon is stirring. Following her map, her heart and an ancient myth, Isabella discovers the true end of her journey: to save the island itself.

Amber Lee Dodd's We Are Giants and Kiran Millwood Hargrave's The Girl of Ink & Stars have both been shortlisted for the Branford Boase Award 2017. The award is given annually to the author and editor of an outstanding debut novel for children. Previous winners include Philip Reeve, Siobhan Dowd, Patrick Ness and Frances Hardinge. The winner will be announced on Wednesday 5th July at a ceremony in London. We Are Giants tells the story of Sydney, who thinks her mum Amy is the best mother in the world, even if she is a bit different. When everyone else kept growing, Amy got to 124cm in height, and then stopped right there. The perfect height, in Sydney?s opinion: big enough to reach the ice-cream at the supermarket, small enough to be special. Sydney?s dad died when she was only five, but her memories of him, her mum?s love, and the company of her brave big sister Jade means she never feels alone . . . But when the family are forced to move house, things get tricky. Sydney and Jade must make new friends, deal with the bullies at their new school and generally figure out the business of growing up. But Sydney doesn?t want to grow up, not if it means getting bigger than her mum. And her mum is barely four feet tall. The Girl of Ink & Stars is set at the start of the Golden Age of mapmaking, and is a skilfully crafted middle-grade adventure novel inspired by the Canarian myth of Guayota and his demon-dogs. Forbidden to leave her island, Isabella dreams of the faraway lands her cartographer father once mapped. When her friend disappears, she volunteers to guide the search. The world beyond the walls is a monster-filled wasteland - and beneath the dry rivers and smoking mountains, a fire demon is stirring. Following her map, her heart and an ancient myth, Isabella discovers the true end of her journey: to save the island itself.

With Utopia For Realists author Rutger Bregman and cognitive neuroscientist Anil Seth (whose book The Presence Chamber is forthcoming from Faber) giving TED talks, and data visualisation designer (author, with Stefanie Posavec, of Dear Data) Giorgia Lupi drawing ?data portraits? of the participants at the TED 17 conference, we left behind in the London office almost feel as if we?re in Vancouver? Davey Alba called Anil Seth's talk his "favourite TED talk so far", and Chris Weller reported that Rutger Bregman's TED talk on universal basic income "just got a standing ovation."

The winner of the Waterstones Children's Book of the Year 2017 is Kiran Millwood Hargrave's extraordinary debut, The Girl of Ink & Stars! The Waterstones Children's Book Prize is voted for by booksellers, and is split into three categories. Kiran scooped up the prize in the Younger Fiction category, before being announced as the overall winner of this year's prize. Waterstones' Managing Director, James Daunt, said: ?We have a sensationally good winner, a work of imagination and drive that will command a special place on the bookshelves of many generations of readers to come." Set at the start of the Golden Age of mapmaking, The Girl of Ink & Stars is inspired by the Canarian myth of Guayota and his demon-dogs. Forbidden to leave her island, Isabella dreams of the faraway lands her cartographer father once mapped. When her friend disappears, she volunteers to guide the search. The world beyond the walls is a monster-filled wasteland - and beneath the dry rivers and smoking mountains, a fire demon is stirring. Following her map, her heart and an ancient myth, Isabella discovers the true end of her journey: to save the island itself. Waterstones' Children's Buyer and Judge, Florentyna Martin, said: "It is always exciting when we see this level of outstanding talent in a new writer, and Kiran has crafted a mesmerising world full of myths, magic and adventure that evokes an atmosphere akin to Pullman?s His Dark Materials." Kiran's second book, The Island at the End of Everything, will be released on 4th May 2017.

Kiran Millwood Hargrave's gorgeous debut The Girl of Ink & Stars has been shortlisted for yet another award! This time, it's Children's Book of the Year at the British Book Awards. Set at the start of the Golden Age of mapmaking, this is a skilfully crafted middle-grade adventure novel inspired by the Canarian myth of Guayota and his demon-dogs. Forbidden to leave her island, Isabella dreams of the faraway lands her cartographer father once mapped. When her friend disappears, she volunteers to guide the search. The world beyond the walls is a monster-filled wasteland - and beneath the dry rivers and smoking mountains, a fire demon is stirring. Following her map, her heart and an ancient myth, Isabella discovers the true end of her journey: to save the island itself. The British Book Awards, or Nibbies, honours the commercial success of publishers, authors and bookshops. There are six individual books of the year awards, and as well as a winner being chosen in each category, an overall book of the year is also chosen from the category winners. "The idea behind the books of the year is to celebrate the whole journey from the author?s mind to the reader?s hand, and showcase the range and depth of modern publishing. It?s about the story itself, but also the way that the publishing contributes both to the story telling and to finding an audience." The winners will be announced on 8th May 2017.

Ed Yong's debut, I Contain Multitudes, has been shortlisted for the 2017 Wellcome Prize. The prize celebrates books which engage with the topics of health and medicine, and the many ways they touch our lives. Chair of judges Val McDermid hailed the 2017 shortlist as one which will "shift perceptions". She said: "One of the ways we communicate is to bring things down to a human level and it's important for science to communicate to non-scientists... There will be people who read one of the books on this list and it will change their lives." I Contain Multitudes is the only debut book on the shortlist. The Wellcome Prize calls it: "An exciting and genre-busting book on microbes, one of science?s hottest topics, by a debut writer with a huge following." In I Contain Multitudes, Ed Yong opens our eyes and invites us to marvel at ourselves and other animals in a new light, less as individuals and more as thriving ecosystems. We learn the invisible and wondrous science behind the corals that construct mighty reefs and the squid that create their own light shows. We see how bacteria can alter our response to cancer-fighting drugs, tune our immune system, influence our evolution and even modify our genetic make-up. And we meet the scientists who are manipulating these microscopic partners to our advantage. In a million tiny ways, I Contain Multitudes will radically change how you think about the natural world, and how you see yourself. The overall winner of the prize will be announced on 24th April 2017.

Ed Yong's New York Times bestselling book I Contain Multitudes has been selected for the shortlist of the LA Times Book Prize under the Science & Technology category. The Los Angeles Times has awarded a set of book prizes annually since 1980. The 2017 prizes for each category will be awarded on the 21st April, opening the LA Times Festival of Books at the University of Southern California.

Three of our authors have been selected for the longlist of the Branford Boase Award 2017: Amber Lee Dodd with We are Giants; Kiran Millwood Hargrave with The Girl of Ink & Stars; and Nat Luurtsema, for Girl Out of Water. The Branford Boase Award is awarded annually or an outstanding first novel to a first-time writer of a book for young people, and is notable for its recognition of the editors' contributions in identifying and nurturing new talent. Previous winners and shortlisted authors include six who later went on to win the CILIP Carnegie Medal, and last year's Costa Book Award winner. Julia Eccleshare, chair of judges, said: "Once again our longlist includes an enormously varied collection of interesting, well-written books. We read fantasy stories, mysteries, contemporary adventures, romances, books that made us laugh and books that made us hopeful; and we met characters who broaden our knowledge and understanding of the world. The variety and quality of the books submitted demonstrate the current healthy, boundary-expanding state of UK children?s literature." The shortlist will be announced on the 8th May 2017, and the winner will be revealed on the 5th July 2017.

Two of Janklow & Nesbit's authors have received nominations for the 2017 Wellcome Prize longlist: Adam Rutherford for A Brief History of Everyone Who Ever Lived, and Ed Yong for his debut I Contain Multitudes. Crime writer Val McDermid, who is chairing the judges this year, spoke out for the importance of both arts and science in an interview in the Guardian, saying that developments in education meant that the Wellcome Prize was more important than ever because it focuses on making science accessible through both fiction and nonfiction. The twelve books on the longlist include seven factual and five fiction titles. Wellcome have sponsored a literary science prize since 1998, redefining it in 2009 to an award which "celebrates the topics of health and medicine in literature." The 2017 shortlist will be announced on the 14th March, at the London Book Fair, and the winner will be revealed on the 24th April at a ceremony at the Wellcome Collection.