Cameron Gets Futuristic
Scholastic’s Lisa Sandell has signed her current author Sharon Cameron (The Dark Unwinding) to a new deal, acquiring world rights to a novel called Rook. Kelly Sonnack at Andrea Brown Literary represented Cameron, whose forthcoming novel, A Spark Unseen, will be published by Scholastic later this month. Rook is a retelling of The Scarlet Pimpernel set in the future; it follows, per Sonnack, “a Sunken City gone mad, an unwanted betrothal, and 13 innocents who will die unless a legend can save them.”

Screenwriter on Young Love
Playwright and screenwriter Stephen Metcalfe sold his debut novel, The Tragic Age, to Sally Richardson and Sara Goodman at St. Martin’s Press. The editors preempted world rights from Linda Chester at Linda Chester and Associates; the deal was also done in coordination with Droemer in Germany (which is owned by SMP parent company Holtzbrinck). Metcalfe wrote the screenplay for Pretty Woman and SMP said the novel was pitched as “Catcher in the Rye for a new generation.” In the book, a high school senior and heir to a major fortune—SMP described the character as “part genius, part philosopher, part social critic, and part lonely misanthrope”—is dramatically changed when he meets a charismatic new student.

Stone Swims to Disney
Tamara Ireland Stone, author of the YA companion novels Time Between Us and Time After Time, sold a new novel called Every Last Word to Lisa Yoskowitz at Disney-Hyperion. The novel was pitched as Glee meets Silver Linings Playbook and follows a popular high school swimmer with OCD who, uncomfortable with her queen-bee status, finds unexpected comfort in an underground poetry club introduced to her by a quirky classmate. Caryn Wiseman at Andrea Brown Literary sold North American rights in the deal, and the book is scheduled for spring 2015. Time After Time, Stone’s sophomore novel, is coming out in October, and Time Between Us, her debut, was optioned by CBS Films.

Akashic Lands Abdoh
Johnny Temple at Akashic Books bought world rights to C.U.N.Y. professor and novelist Salar Abdoh’s Tehran at Twilight. (In a separate deal, Abdoh signed on to edit Tehran Noir, a forthcoming installment of Akashic’s ongoing noir series.) Agent Jessica Papin at Dystel & Goderich Literary Management represented Abdoh and said the novel “examines the relationship between Iran and the United States through the prism of friendship, betrayal, and international intrigue.”

Basic Buys Holocaust ‘Explanation’
Independent historian Dan McMillan has sold, arguably, his life’s work, a book called How Could This Happen: Explaining the Holocaust. Lara Heimert at Basic Books took U.S. and Canadian rights in the deal from agent William Clark at William Clark Associates. McMillan first read about the Holocaust as a teenager in the 1970s and, looking to better understand the tragedy, learned German, then studied history and German as an undergrad at Stanford, before getting his Ph.D. in history from Columbia. In the book, Clark said, McMillan offers “the first comprehensive study of the causes of the Holocaust” and devotes the entire text to “explaining why the Holocaust happened.”