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Eye Books has acquired paperback and ebook rights to The Low Road, the award-winning debut novel by Katharine Quarmby, following the financial difficulties of the book’s original publisher, Unbound.
The deal is the first acquisition by former Atlantic Books head Will Atkinson since he joined Eye as publisher and managing director in December.
Originally published by Unbound in hardback in June 2023, The Low Road is a literary historical novel, based on a true story, about two poverty-stricken young women in the early 19th century who are transported to Australia for petty crime. They also become lovers.
The novel, based on a true story the author found in her Norfolk home town and spanning Norfolk, London and Australia, is currently on the shortlist for the New Angle Prize for East Anglian literature. It also won the silver medal at the Coffee Pot Book Awards for women’s historical fiction.
‘This is historical fiction at its truest and best,’ says Atkinson, who acquired world paperback and ebook rights directly from the author. ‘Katharine is a skilled researcher, immersing the reader in pre-Victorian England and Australia at a time when the poor and the marginalised suffered horribly. But the narrative also beats a positive drum of redemptive love, friendship and family. I’m delighted to have the opportunity to make sure The Low Road lives on.’
Katharine Quarmby has had a long career as an investigative journalist in print and broadcast media. Her reporting on Rwanda won the One World Trust Award for Best News Film of 1999, and in 2011 she was shortlisted for the Paul Foot Award for her work on disability hate crime. She has written several non-fiction and children’s books. The Low Road is her first novel.
She says: ‘It’s a very strange experience to be on the shortlist for a serious literary award just as your publisher gets into serious trouble. I couldn’t be more delighted that Eye Books has come to The Low Road’s rescue. I love the design for their new paperback edition and I can’t wait to hold the finished book in my hand.’
The Low Road will be published in paperback in November 2025, under Eye’s ‘Lightning’ fiction imprint, and on ebook in July.
