West Country novelist turns from light rural comedies to a saga of secrets, bitterness and revenge set in the toughest decade for farmers since the Thirties
Lightning Books has signed the new novel by Caroline Kington, the widow of columnist and broadcaster Miles Kington, for UK release.
A Long Shadow is a rural saga of secrets, bitterness and revenge set at the beginning of the millennium. When a young farmer is found with his brains blown out, his wife takes on his mantle while trying to solve the mystery of his death.
The novel had its origins in a feature that Kington, a former TV director and producer, made for Channel 4 News at the turn of this century about the pressures on farmers as a result of BSE and foot-and-mouth disease.
As well as A Long Shadow, Lightning has acquired the rights to her three previous novels, A Summerstoke Affair, Spring Mischief and A Tangled Summer, which were first published by Orion. Like A Long Shadow, this trilogy of light comedies is set in rural Somerset, where Kington has lived for many years.
Scott Pack, Lightning's editor-at-large, acquired world rights directly from the author.
He said: “I have been working with Caroline for the past year or so, editing a collection of Miles Kington's letters, and at some point we ended up discussing her own work. I must confess I persuaded her to let me have a sneak peek and I knew right away that I wanted to publish it. Fortunately, the rest of the team at Lightning Books felt the same way.”
Caroline Kington spent most of her working life in theatre and television, as a director and producer.
Since her husband’s death in 2008, she has posthumously published three of his books: a humorous memoir of his illness, called How Shall I Tell the Dog?; a collection of his columns and other writings, The Best By Miles; and a collection of his celebrated ‘Franglais’ columns that had not appeared in book form before, Le Bumper Book of Franglais.
Lightning will publish the Summerstoke trilogy as ebooks in 2018 and A Long Shadow in 2019.
