Bloomsbury USA's Colin Dickerman got world rights to a first novel, a legal thriller called The Misdemeanor Man by lawyer Dylan Schaffer, about a less-than-dynamic public defender, a Barry Manilow sound-alike on the side, involved in a high-profile murder case; the agent was Lydia Wills at Writers & Artists, for publication next spring.... Jack Shoemaker at his new Avalon imprint bought a new novel by India's Ruth Prawer Jhabvala called My Nine, described as a fictionalized memoir. He bought U.S. rights from British publisher John Murray and will publish next spring; the author's novels for Doubleday were edited by the late Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis.... Peter Kaufman at the Intelligent TV agency sold Hyperion's Will Schwalbe a book that will tie in with a PBS documentary in November called Reporting America at War and featuring Walter Cronkite, David Halberstam, Morley Safer, Ward Just and Andy Rooney; Steve Ives at Insignia Films is doing the show.... John Duff at Penguin's Avery imprint bought world rights in a book by wellness expert (and Discovery Channel medical director) Andrea Pennington called The Pennington Plan for Wellness from Todd Shuster, for publication next May.... Pocket's Louise Burke bought a first book by popular radio talk show host Glenn Beck called The Real America: Messages from the Heart and the Heartland; the seller was George Hitzik at N.S. Beinstock, and publication is for late September.