Mandanipour to Knopf

On the basis of a partial translation, Knopf’s Robin Desser acquired North American rights to Censoring an Iranian Love Story by Shahriar Mandanipour via Georges Borchardt, who accepted what he called a “substantial” advance. The novel is the first to be translated into English for Mandanipour, regarded as one of the most successful and accomplished writers in Iran today. In the book, set in contemporary Iran, two people fall in love through secret messages hidden in code in pages of outlawed books; within the text, through asides to the reader, the novel offers a comment on the pressures of writing within the Islamic regime. Mandanipour is currently a visiting scholar at Harvard. Knopf expects to publish in spring 2009; rights have already been sold in the U.K., Italy, Spain, Brazil and Holland.

Firsts for Park, Santora

Chris Park, formerly an editor at Center Street and now an agent at Foundry, has made her first sale, which is Frank Santora’s Identity Crisis; DennyBoultinghouse at Howard Books won North American rights to two books for six figures at auction. The subject of a December New Yorker profile, megachurch pastor Santora’s will show readers how to transform their lives by learning to see themselves the way God sees them. Howard Books is a Louisiana-based CBA house acquired by S&S in 2006; it’s a part of Touchstone/Fireside.

Inside Networks

Tracy Behar at Little, Brown preempted North American rights to Nicholas Christakis and James Fowler’s untitled book on social networks and how they affect our health, wealth, happiness, relationships, political and religious behaviors, tastes and more; Katinka Matson made the sale. Christakis is a social scientist and physician at Harvard, and Fowler is a political scientist at the University of California at San Diego.

In the Middle East

Emily Loose at the Free Press bought world rights to The Shia Revival author Vali Nasr’s untitled book on the Middle East via Susan Rabiner. Nasr will concentrate on Iran, Pakistan and Turkey to explain how events in those countries illustrate emerging trends in the region and why these trends are being misread in the West. Pub date is 2009.

At Da Capo, Robert Pigeon bought world rights to Steve Fainaru’s Big Boy Rules via RobertShepard. Washington Post reporter and 2006 Pulitzer finalist Fainaru will travel with a group of “security contractors”—among the thousands of armed men in Iraq doing jobs the military can’t or won’t do—to reveal what drives them to do this dangerous work. Pub date is September 2008.

Deals for Robbins, Lefcourt

David Robbins has moved to Simon & Schuster in a world English deal for his new novel, The Comfort Woman; Colin Fox will edit and Tracy Fisher at William Morris handled the deal. The novel will detail the story of a 19-year-old Korean girl forced into sexual slavery by the Imperial Army in WWII and her love for a young American internee at Los Banos, the Japanese internment camp in the Philippines. Robbins is the author of several historical novels and was most recently published by Bantam. Publication is planned for summer 2009.

Scott Allen at MacAdam/Cage bought North American rights to Peter Lefcourt’s Le Jet Lag via Jane Dystel. Against the backdrop of parties, sex and drugs at the Cannes Film Festival, the novel will follow a motley crew whose paths cross to scandalous and hilarious effect. Lefcourt is the author of The Deal, The Dreyfus Affair, Di and I and The Manhattan Beach Project; tentative pub is fall 2008.

Putnam Debut

Peternelle van Arsdale at Putnam bought North American rights to Lynn Cullen’s first two historical novels via Emma Sweeney. The first is The Black Legend, based on the true, little-known story of Sofonisba Anguissola, a renowned female artist who studied under Michelangelo and joined the 16th-century Spanish court of King Felipe II. Cullen is the author of several books for children and young adults, including I Am Rembrandt’s Daughter, which was a 2007 B&N Discover Great New Writers selection.

Bialosky Takes Two

Jill Bialosky at Norton just bought world rights to a debut novel by Samantha Peale titled The American Painter Emma Dial; Robert Guinsler at Sterling Lord made the sale. The novel, about an artist’s assistant in New York’s contemporary art world struggling with her job and her longing to be an artist in her own right, was first submitted in 2004 and went through two rewrites before landing this deal. Peale worked as Jeff Koons’s studio assistant for four years.

Bialosky also bought The Culinary Imagination: How (and Why) We Think, Write and Work with Food in the 21st Century by Sandra Gilbert via Ellen Levine. The book will explore the ways contemporary cooks, writers, artists, filmmakers, moralists and even politicians have been imagining and reimagining food throughout the last century. Gilbert is a professor of English at UC Davis; Norton has world English rights.