Klausner Goes to Poppy
Cindy Eagan at Little, Brown's Poppy imprint bought North American rights to comedian and entertainer Julie Klausner's debut YA novel, Muses. Agent Scott Mendel, of Mendel Media, brokered the deal for Klausner, a New York City–based performer whose whimsical dating book, I Don't Care About Your Band, was published as a paperback original by Gotham in February 2010. In Muses, a 15-year-old girl at an all-girls art camp finds out that, despite the place's stuffy image, the camp is, as Mendel put it, "host to lewd summers filled with back-stabbing [and] back-rubbing." Mendel added that the book was pitched as "Little Darlings meets Glee, on acid."

Falls Lands at Scholastic
In his first acquisition at Scholastic Press, editor Nick Eliopulos took world rights (excluding U.K. and Australia/New Zealand) to Kat Falls's dystopian YA romance trilogy, the Fetch. The three-book deal was for mid-six figures, and the first book in the series is scheduled for fall 2012. (Falls's middle-grade debut, Dark Life, also the first in a trilogy, was published by Scholastic Press in April 2010 and is set in an underwater world.) The Fetch is set in a near future in which America has been literally separated—a wall has been erected—into East and West after a disease ravages the eastern half of the country. When a 16-year-old girl is forced to travel east into the "savage zone" on a dangerous mission, she winds up meeting a mysterious boy. Agent Josh Adams, of Adams Literary, brokered the deal.

Riverhead Takes Rona Jaffe Award Winner
Elise Capron at the Dijkstra Agency sold world rights to Tiphanie Yanique's debut novel, The Land of Love and Drowning, to Riverhead v-p and executive editor Sarah McGrath. Yanique was a winner of a 2010 Rona Jaffe Writers' Award, and was a National Book Foundation 5 Under 35 selectee for her short story collection How to Escape from a Leper Colony (Graywolf Press). Land is a family saga set in the Virgin Islands that traces a group of characters through the history of the U.S. colony, from the era of slavery into the modern age.

Crown Re-Ups with Unger
John Glusman at Crown bought two more thrillers by bestselling author Lisa Unger. Elaine Markson at Markson Thoma brokered the world rights deal for Unger, and the untitled books are scheduled for 2013 and 2014, respectively. Unger's latest work, Darkness, My Old Friend, is scheduled from Crown this August.

El-Hai's ‘Lobotomist' Optioned
Bill Contardi, working on behalf of agent Laura Langlie, sold film rights to Jack El-Hai's 2005 book The Lobotomist (John Wiley & Sons). Realm Pictures producer Brad Fischer (Shutter Island and Black Swan), working with Leonardo DiCaprio's production shingle, Appian Way, acquired the dramatic rights to the book, a biography of a tragic figure, Walter J. Freeman. Freeman is the brilliant doctor who found infamy instead of medical glory after he introduced the lobotomy as a treatment for mental illness.

Briefs
Katie McHugh at Da Capo took world rights to wedding blogger Meg Keene's A Practical Wedding in a deal brokered by agent Maura Teitelbaum. Keene's book offers tips on how to create a dream wedding on a tight budget.

Knopf Children's Books editor Erin Clarke bought world rights to Elizabeth LaBan's YA novel, Blind Love, from Uwe Stender at TriadaUS Literary Agency. The book, scheduled for 2012, is set in a ritzy private school and tracks the fallout from an English teacher assigning his yearly "tragedy paper."