Bestselling British children's author Michelle Paver has signed a world rights five-book deal with Penguin UK's Puffin imprint for a new series called Gods & Warriors. The first book in the Bronze Age-set tale is scheduled to come out in autumn 2012.
Paver is the author of the bestselling Chronicles of Ancient Darkness series, which HarperCollins's Katherine Tegen Books publishes stateside. The first title in that six-book series, Wolf Brother, was released by Tegen Books in February 2005. According to Penguin, Chronicles of Ancient Darkness, which has been published in 38 different countries, has millions of copies in print. (Penguin estimated that the series has sold 1 million copies in the U.K. alone.) Ghost Hunter, the last title in Chronicles of Ancient Darkness, which Tegen Books released in June, won the British Guardian Children’s Fiction Prize for 2010.
Puffin editorial director Elv Moody brokered the deal with Peter Cox at Redhammer Management Ltd. Speaking to the move to Penguin, Cox said: "The decision to move to Puffin wasn't taken lightly. [Their team] feels excited by the future, not daunted by it. This willingness to engage with the future--and indeed to make it their own--is the essence of today's successful publisher."
Through the global deal, Penguin will publish the new series in the UK, as well as the U.S. and its other international divisions in Australia, New Zealand, Canada, India and South Africa.
