Slain Charlie Hebdo Editor's Book to be Published Posthumously
Reagan Arthur, publisher of Little, Brown and Company, announced the acquisition of Open Letter: On Blasphemy, Islamophobia and the True Enemies of Free Expression, a posthumous manifesto by Stéphane Charbonnier, known as Charb, the editor in chief of Charlie Hebdo, with a foreword by Adam Gopnik.
On January 7, 2015, two gunmen stormed the offices of Charlie Hebdo, the French satirical magazine, and took the lives of twelve men and women, but they called for one man by name: “Charb.” Charb was an outspoken proponent of social justice, a critic of hypocrisy in all its forms, and a renowned political cartoonist in his own right. Soon after his death on November 7, it was revealed that he had finished a book just two days before his murder on the very issues at the heart of the attacks: blasphemy, Islamophobia, and the necessary courage of satirists.
Little, Brown and Company acquired North American rights from French publisher Les Echappés. Open Letter will be published by Little, Brown and Company in January 2016: $16.00 U.S./$19.50 Canada and e-book $9.99.
