Join us for the return of the SYP UK book club on Monday 20th May at 7pm on Zoom! We’ll be discussing James, the newest novel from bestselling author Percival Everett.
The bi-monthly SYP UK Book Club offers a unique publishing perspective on the trends and choices behind the books we choose. With talking points focused on various aspects of publishing, including editorial, marketing, design, and production, we encourage you to engage with the book however you are compelled to!
We will be joined by Publisher Maria Rejt for a portion of the discussion, with opportunities to ask questions about her experience of the publishing process as well as her thoughts on James.
Hello. I’m Maria Rejt, Publisher of Mantle, an imprint of Pan Macmillan that was launched in 2010. My passion is for great writing and storytelling where the characters always take centre stage, and I especially love novels about ‘the outsider’. Authors I publish include The Sunday Times bestselling Natalie Haynes, Kate Morton, Kate Mosse, C. J. Sansom, Andrea Camilleri and Laura Shepherd-Robinson, and prize-winners Charlotte Mendelson and Ray Celestin. I am especially proud that Percival Everett, the Booker-Shortlisted author of The Trees, has joined the Mantle list with his extraordinary and brilliant new novel, James.
The past fascinates me as a way to make sense of where the tides of history have brought us, and great historical fiction can move and inspire us like no other.
I have also always loved publishing crime fiction that brings something new to the genre and contemporary novels with an edge.
Novels in translation where a sense of place is important and novels about the power of reading are also perfect for the Mantle imprint.
I never forget that reading is one of the greatest pleasures we can enjoy and share.
An enthralling and ferociously funny reimagining of Mark Twain’s The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, told from the perspective of the enslaved Jim. Written by Booker Prize-shortlisted Percival Everett, James is set to be the literary event of 2024.
The Mississippi River, 1861. When the enslaved Jim overhears that he is about to be sold to a new owner in New Orleans and separated from his wife and daughter forever, he decides to hide on nearby Jackson’s Island until he can formulate a plan. Meanwhile, Huck Finn has faked his own death to escape his violent father who recently returned to town. Thus begins a dangerous and transcendent journey by raft along the Mississippi River, towards the elusive promise of the free states and beyond. As James and Huck begin to navigate the treacherous waters, each bend in the river holds the promise of both salvation and demise.
With rumours of a brewing war, James must face the burden he carries: the family he is desperate to protect and the constant lie he must live. And together, the unlikely pair must face the most dangerous odyssey of them all . . .
From the shadows of Huck Finn’s mischievous spirit, Jim emerges to reclaim his voice, defying the conventions that have consigned him to the margins.
Percival Everett is the author of over thirty books, including The Trees, which was shortlisted for the 2022 Booker Prize and won the 2022 Bollinger Everyman Wodehouse Prize. He has received the Hurston/Wright Legacy Award and the PEN Center USA Award for Fiction, has been a Pulitzer Prize finalist, and is Distinguished Professor of English at the University of Southern California. His novel Erasure has now been adapted into the critically acclaimed and Oscar-winning film American Fiction.
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The SYP UK Book Club is open to all. There are no expectations for you to contribute to every part of the conversation or have your camera on. Whether you’ve finished the book or haven’t even opened the cover, we would love to see you there! With discussions not limited to the story of a book, we hope everybody will have something to engage with, from publishing trends to judging books by their covers!
If you have any questions about this event please contact us at sypeventsofficer@gmail.com.