Happy New Year! At the Pontas Agency, we’re excited to see new stories become books, TV series and films in 2024. Here are the first books by Pontas clients that will be published between January and March 2024.
January will be a packed month, with books both in original language and in translation hitting bookstores across the globe.
In French, Luce Michel is publishing The Curse Of The Three Saints (La bande de l’abribus – Du rififi en psychiatrie), the first installment in The Bus Stop Mystery Club series, with Blacklab/Hachette Livre on January 17th. Set in the idyllic hills near the Côte d’Azur, The Bus Stop Mystery Club series brings a welcome breath of fresh air and joie de vivre to the cozy noir genre. Book #2, Villainy at the Villa, will be published this fall.
Blanca Busquets, one of the most prominent figures in contemporary Catalan literature, is publishing her new novel on January 10th with Proa. It’s entitled Els dies robats (The Stolen Days) and is set against the backdrop of a small village in the Catalan Pyrenees where a group of strangers drawn together for a seemingly ordinary yoga and Pilates retreat, suddenly face a global alarm that brings life as they know it to a standstill.
Also on January 17th, Mayte Uceda, who joined the Pontas Agency as a client in 2023, will see her next novel published with Editorial Planeta in the original Spanish. El maestro de azúcar (The Sugar Master) is a historical romance novel set in colonial Cuba immediately before The Cuban War of Independence with a love triangle that will have you on the edge of your seat.
In translation, Éditions de l’Aube will be publishing the French translation of Carl Nixon’s The Waters (under the title Quelquefois, ils leur pardonnent) on January 10th and the French translation of Jill Johnson’s Devil’s Breath will be published on January 25th by Michel Lafon, who acquired the rights at auction.
In February, UK readers can get ready to discover South African author Ijangolet S. Ogwang’s debut novel An Image in a Mirror, previously published in 2018 by Blackbird Books and now publishing in the UK with Legend Press. Set between Uganda and South Africa, An Image in a Mirror is the story of Nyakale and Achen, identical twins pulled apart by their mother’s decision to give one of them away to her sister for a chance at a better life.
In the US, Deep Vellum will be publishing the English translation of Fiston Mwanza Mujila’s second novel, La Danse du Vilain (The Villain’s Dance), translated once again by Roland Glasser. The novel was published in French in 2020 and was the recipient of the prestigious Prix les Afriques 2021. La Danse du Vilain had also been previously nominated for the Prix Wepler La Poste after its publication in French with Éditions Metailié. Deep Vellum’s publication is slated for February 20th. Rights also previously sold to Al Kotobkhan (Arabic), Jensen & Dalgaard (Danish), Nottetempo (Italian), Zsolnay (German), and Rámus Förlaget (Swedish).
Two highly awaited debuts will be out in March. These Letters End in Tears, a heart-wrenching forbidden love story of a Christian girl with a rebellious heart and a Muslim girl leading a double life, by UK-based Cameroonian author Musih Tedji Xaviere will be published in the US with Catapult, in the UK with Jacaranda Books, and in West Africa with Masobe Books. Rights also sold to Klim (Danish) and Orlando (Dutch). These Letters End in Tears won the Pontas & JJ Bola Emerging Writers Prize in 2021.
In France, Charleston/Léduc are publishing debut author Benjamin Carteret’s Perséphone as a super lead title for 2024, after acquiring rights in a three-way auction. Perséphone is a dual-voiced retelling of the famous Greek myth about Kore/Persephone and her mother, Demeter, goddess of the harvest which explores the universal, urgent questions of motherhood, patriarchy, freedom and humankind’s relationship to the environment.
Last but not least, March will also see the publication of the long-awaited translation in English of Mexican author Verónica E. Llaca’s La herencia under the title Blood Ties, which will be available in the UK from Mountain Leopard Press. La herencia was originally published in Spanish in 2021 with Planeta México and translation rights have also been sold to Faro Editorial (Portuguese in Brazil) and Eksmo (Russian).
For more information about any of the above titles, please contact Anna Soler-Pont (anna@pontas-agency.com)