DEAL OF THE WEEK

Hill Takes ‘Nothing’ to HMH

Fiona Hill, former deputy assistant to the president and senior director for European and Russian affairs on the National Security Council, sold There Is Nothing for You Here to Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. Alex Littlefield nabbed North American rights to the book, subtitled Opportunity in an Age of Decline, from Andrew Nurnberg Associates. HMH said the title, set for fall 2021, will “explain how our current, polarized moment is the result of long historical trends... that have long afflicted Russia and the United Kingdom, and which now are beginning to affect the United States.”

FROM THE U.S.

Loves Tackle Love in ‘Redemption’

In a second deal at Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, Rakia Clark bought a memoir by a couple featured in Brandon Stanton’s Humans of New York social media accounts. Clark acquired world rights to The Redemption of Bobby Love: A Story of Faith, Family and Justice from Brian DeFiore at DeFiore and Co. Husband-and-wife authors Bobby and Cheryl Love, who are writing with Lori L. Tharps, chronicle their relationship in the book—for more than 30 years, she didn’t know he was an escaped convict from the Jim Crow South. Clark said Redemption, which is set for fall 2021, grapples with “marriage, forgiveness, and larger themes about Blackness in America.”

Scribner Looks ‘Upwards’ with Barr

With a six-figure preempt, Colin Harrison at Scribner bought Jason M. Barr’s Ever Upwards: The Global Quest to Build Skyscrapers and Skylines in the 21st Century. Chris Kepner at the Kepner Agency, who sold world rights to the book, said it “chronicles the social, political, and economic forces behind the global rise of today’s skyscrapers and skylines, which is happening at a historic pace.” The author, a professor of economics at Rutgers University–Newark, is, Kepner noted, “one of the world’s foremost experts on the economics of skyscrapers.”

ESPN Journo Talks ‘Sex’ for SMP

Alice Pfeifer, at St. Martin’s Press, took world English rights, for six figures, to The Determination of Sex by Katie Barnes. The author, who was represented by Kiele Raymond at Thompson Literary Agency, is an ESPN journalist, and the book, per Raymond, is “an explosive investigation into the outsized impact of American sports on our cultural understanding of sex and gender.” The agent elaborated that the book “will bring readers to the front lines of the battle for equal rights in our country’s athletic institutions and prove once and for all that sex exists on a spectrum.”


Nagorski Gets Freudian at S&S

Hitlerland author and former Newsweek journalist Andrew Nagorski sold To Die in Freedom: Sigmund Freud’s Unlikely Rescue Squad to Bob Bender at Simon & Schuster. Robert Gottlieb at Trident Media Group represented Nagorski, selling North American rights to the book; Gottlieb said it is an account “focusing on the unlikely mix of personalities who worked together to convince Freud to escape Vienna after the Nazi occupation.”


Threshold Weighs ‘The Cost’

Threshold Editions acquired Maria Bartiromo and James Freeman’s The Cost: Trump, China, and American Revival. Natasha Simons bought world rights to the book, which Threshold said will detail the economic recovery the U.S. needs following the coronavirus pandemic. Bartiromo and Freeman were represented by CAA. Cost is set for October.