Zeno Literary Agency Ltd.

Charles Tan’s excellent Bibliophile Stalker Blog has just put up a brand new interview with Aliette de Bodard conducted by Marshall Payne. In it Aliette talks about her background and, of course, her writing, and she also  discusses the odd but fortuitous circumstances which brought about her first book deal…

You just signed a three-book deal with Angry Robot. What can you tell us about that?

Well, this was totally a case of serendipity. Last year, I was rather miffed when British Airways cancelled my flight home from World Fantasy, leaving me stuck in a shabby hotel with not much in the way of distraction. By sheer luck, there were also two people in the hotel: John Berlyne, who was setting up a new agency in the UK, and Marc Gascoigne, editor of the new HarperCollins Angry Robot. Together, they cajoled me into pitching the novel I had completed at the time (and which I’d had no intention of pitching at all, making for a rather flustered few seconds while I got my sentences under control).

And, as it turned out, the first became my agent, and negotiated a three-book deal with the second, for the novel in question and two sequels. It all feels very surreal, but there you have it.

The novel is called Servant of the Underworld, and is a fantasy-mystery set in Aztec times, featuring death-priest-cum-investigator Acatl (and ghostly jaguars, bloodthirsty gods and fingernail-eating monsters). It’s a wild, fast-paced ride through a blood-soaked land where the old gods are manifest, and quick to demand their due in all kinds of unpleasant ways. It’s due in print Spring 2010.

• Read the whole interview here.

We are delighted to announce début deals for not just one, but two of our talented young authors – namely Aliette de Bodard and Lavie Tidhar, both of whom have  just been snapped up by the exciting new genre imprint Angry Robot.

Aliette’s SERVANTS OF THE UNDERWORLD is the first of three books sold to Angry Robot and Publishing Director Marc Gascoigne describes it thus : “… a wild mix of fantasy and crime novel, set in Aztec times. In this alternate world, though, the gods are real and stalk the temples, demanding sacrifices from the people. Amidst the bloodletting, a serial killer appears to be getting away with murder – but how do you find a murderer in a world where the streets themselves are awash with blood?”

SERVANTS OF THE UNDERWORLD is due for publication in Spring 2010 and two further novels set in the same world will follow in due course.

Aliette’s is  a name already known to many through her wonderful short fiction (she was a nominee for this year’s Campbell Award and is a Writers of the Future winner) and her deserved good fortune came about through a curious incident of her being in the wrong place at the right time.  Stuck in Calgary an extra night due to a flight delay following last year’s World Fantasy Convention, she found herself passing time at with an equally delayed agent – Zeno’s own John Berlyne -  and Angry Robot‘s Marc Gascoigne. “It was a bit cheeky of us to cajole her into pitching there and then,” says Gascoigne, ” but I’m very glad she did. We’re always looking for interesting new books to publish, but that day it was like the ancient gods themselves had all conspired to bring us to that spot! These are wonderful books, full of wild fantasy and cunning detection, and I’m so proud and pleased we’ll be publishing them.”

Angry Robot have also acquired via John Berlyne of the Zeno Agency, three books from rising star Lavie Tidhar, an author described by LOCUS as “an emerging master”.

Tidhar’s THE BOOKMAN is a steampunk adventure described by Angry Robot‘s Marc Gascoigne as an “… exciting mix of Victorian culture and anachronistically advanced technology. In THE BOOKMAN, a shadowy terrorist of that name brings London society practically to a standstill by placing bombs inside books. After several atrocities against London’s theatres, he outdoes himself with an audacious attack on the blessing of the launch of the first expedition to Mars. For young poet Orphan, whose girlfriend is killed in that blast, it is the start of an epic adventure that will bring him face-to-face not only with the master-criminal but his own lost past.” THE BOOKMAN will be published by Angry Robot in Spring 2010 and will run to at least two further volumes.

Tidhar looks to have a busy year ahead with a number of short stories in the pipeline for publication and a novella, CLOUD PERMUTATIONS due from the award winning British small press PS Publishing, these following in the footsteps of his recently released collaboration with fellow Israelli author Nir Yaniv, THE TEL AVIV DOSSIER which was published to enthusiastic reviews by ChiZine.

Stories by Zeno clients Aliette de Bodard and Stephen Volk grace the pages of the brand new issue of British horror mag Black Static. In terms of fiction therein, that makes it 20% Zeno!

Alliette’s story is called The Lonely Heart and Steve’s has the typically uncompromising title of Fear.

Issue #09 is out now – subscribe here.

We are absolutely delighted to welcome Aliette de Bodard to the Zeno agency.

John Berlyne says “Aliette’s reputation as a rising star of genre fiction had reached me long before I had the pleasure of meeting her in person at last year’s World Fantasy Convention in Calgary. That reputation was well founded – her work is both delightful and ingenous, her voice distinctive and her feeling for history and the ancient civilisations where she sets much of her work is instictive, thorough and a credit to her extensive research. No longer can she be considered merely one of the Writers of the Future (she was a winner of that competition on 2007) – Aliette is a very much a writer of today and one that is going to be around for a long time to come.“