Jul 28, 2021

Sugar23 and Mariner Books Partner To Publish Abi Morgan’s Book ‘This Is Not A Pity Memoir’

Mariner Books, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers, has acquired North American rights to This Is Not a Pity Memoir, the first book by award-winning screenwriter and playwright Abi Morgan. The book, part of collaboration with the publishing arm of Michael Sugar’s Sugar23, is set to be published June 2022.

“We’ve been huge fans of Abi’s from afar for a long time so it’s a great honor to help publish her first book,” said Sugar23’s Michael Sugar and Angela Ledgerwood, editorial director of Sugar23 Books. “We were enthralled by Abi’s story from page one of her manuscript and couldn’t quite believe how beautifully she managed to transform the story of her husband’s illness—and her own—into a galvanizing reminder of how to live and love fully.” Ledgerwood will oversee the publication of This Is Not a Pity Memoir on behalf of Sugar23.

This Is Not a Pity Memoir is about an ordinary day that marks the end of ordinary life. When Abi found Jacobher partner of eighteen years and father to their children, lying on the bathroom floor, it was clear that something was very wrong. He was rushed to hospital and, while the medical teams tried to work out what had caused his collapse, he was put into a coma. It was only when he came out of the coma, several months later, that it became clear that Jacob would never be the person he used to be.

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