Hopkins Goes Adult for Seven Figures
Atria Books' Sarah Branham bought world rights, in a major two-book deal, to Ellen Hopkins's debut adult novel, Triangles. Laura Rennert at the Andrea Brown Agency represented Hopkins, winning a seven-figure advance for the author. Hopkins has written a number of bestselling YA books for the S&S children's imprint Margaret K. McElderry and her next YA novel, Fallout (published by McElderry), is scheduled for September 14. Triangles will be written in verse, continuing the style Hopkins has maintained in her children's books, and follows three friends, each turning 40, as they face varied midlife crises ranging from infidelity to the difficulties of raising teenagers.

S&S Gets Techno-Kinky
In another S&S acquisition, this one at the house's flagship imprint, editor Sarah Knight took North American rights, in a pre-empt, to Michael Olson's debut Strange Flesh. Olson, who's worked as a banker and software engineer, earned a graduate degree at NYU's Interactive Technology Program, where he then went on to teach. His novel, which ICM's Jennifer Joel sold, and which S&S said explores "sex and games," and delves into a new area known as teledildonics (or cyberdildonics), which are sex toys that can be controlled by computers. According to S&S, the novel delivers a "noir-laced narrative" and follows a professional hacker hired to find the brother of an old friend after the brother supposedly vanishes into an alternate-reality game he created. Strange Flesh is currently scheduled for 2012.

Abrams Buys Abrams
In a deal with a coincidental overlap in monikers, Jennifer Levesque at Abrams Image bought world English rights to NBC News correspondent Dan Abrams's Man Down. Agent Laura Dail brokered the deal for Abrams, the chief legal analyst for NBC, who jumps into the battle of the sexes with the book, which carries the lengthy subtitle: Proof Beyond a Reasonable Doubt That Women Are Better Cops, Drivers, Gamblers, Spies, World Leaders, Beer Tasters, Hedge Fund Managers, and Just About Everything Else. In addition to his TV post, Abrams founded the Abrams Media Network, which has launched such sites as Mediaite and Styleite. The book is tentatively scheduled for May 2011, to coincide with Mother's Day.

Workman Gets Into Memory Game
Bob Miller and Suzie Bolotin at Workman bought North American rights to a book on Alzheimer's by aging and memory expert, Dr. Gary Small. Small teaches psychiatry at UCLA, where he also heads the school's Center on Aging, and has written five books, including the forthcoming (from Morrow) The Naked Lady Who Stood on Her Head: A Psychiatrist's Stories of His Most Bizarre Cases. Agent Sandra Dijkstra brokered the deal, and Small is again working with his coauthor Gigi Vorgan.

Pegasus Finds France
Agent Jason Allen Ashlock, at Movable Type, sold North American rights to a memoir by longtime journalist Gerry Dryansky and his wife, Joanne Dryansky, called Lost and Found in France. Jessica Case and Claiborne Hancock at Pegasus bought the book. Gerry, who's been the senior European correspondent for Condé Nast for many years—he was also one of the founding editors of Condé Nast Traveler—has spent decades living in France with his wife, writing about food and travel. Ashlock says the book will touch on both topics, chronicling the couple's life abroad as well as the food they've encountered in the French countryside, where "gifted artisans are preserving a cuisine that not only satisfies the senses but creates a tie to time and place."