Cassandra King, who scored for Hyperion with The Sunday Wife and has another novel coming from there soon, has just signed with the house's Ellen Archer and Leslie Wells for another two books; the first will be The Queen of Broken Hearts, about a divorce therapist in marital trouble of her own. Marly Rusoff made the sale, of world English and audio.... Amistad's Dawn Davis and Janklow & Nesbit's Eric Simonoff, who combined to publish Edward P. Jones's Pulitzer Prize—winning The Known World, have joined forces again, on a first novel by Caribbean author Marie-Elena John. It's called Unburnable, and is a multigenerational saga, set on the island of Dominica, about the legacy of a murder.... Legal thriller author Lisa Scottoline has signed a major three-book deal with HarperCollins publisher Brian Murray, by way of agent Molly Friedrich at Aaron Priest; it was for North American and audio rights, and Carolyn Marino will again be her editor.... The first major biography of reclusive Southern author Harper Lee, to be called Mockingbird after her most famous novel, was signed for Henry Holt by George Hodgman; it was a North American deal with Jeff Kleinman at Graybill & English.... Also at Holt, Vanessa Mobley signed New York Times Magazine political writer Matt Bai for a book about the search by the Democrats for a new approach in the wake of their election defeat; Sarah Chalfant at Wylie made the sale, for publication in 2007.... Crown's Rick Horgan won an auction for a book by the CIA commander in Afghanistan detailing the hunt for Osama bin Laden and speculating on how he escaped pursuit. The CIA operative is using the pen name Eric L. and the book will be co-authored with AP reporter Ralph Pezzullo.