I also am grateful to my friends Inspector Roger Nield MBE (Surrey Police, rtd) and WPC Lucy Nield (Surrey Police, rtd) for answering my questions about British policing. If I’ve gotten something right, it’s thanks to Roger and Lucy; if wrong, it’s all my fault. Or it’s different in this somewhat alternate 1983. . . .
I must thank my agents for their expertise, encouragement, and unfailing business acumen: Jill Grinberg and her team at Jill Grinberg Literary Management in New York; Fiona Inglis and the gang at Curtis Brown Australia; and Matthew Snyder and his associates, who look after film/TV for me at CAA in Los Angeles.
My publishers help me in many different ways to do my job and make beautiful books; they also market and sell them superbly, and I am honored to be on their lists: Katherine Tegen and the HarperCollins crew in the USA; Eva Mills and everyone at Allen & Unwin in Australia; and Gillian Redfearn and the team at Gollancz in the United Kingdom. I have also been very lucky to work with fantastic audiobook publishers, at Listening Library/Random House, Bolinda, and Brilliance. I am also very grateful to the translators and publishers who make my books work in other languages and countries.
Booksellers have been absolutely essential in helping my books reach readers. I am grateful to all booksellers, not only for supporting my own books but for everything you do to connect people and reading. I would particularly like to thank Margaret and Teki Dalton and the Dalton family, and everyone I worked with at Dalton’s Bookshop in Canberra, way back in 1987 when the height of bookshop technology was calling the Penguin warehouse every evening to recite a list of ISBNs for restocking.
I should also mention that the modern-era Foyles bookshops have all the good aspects of the fabled older store at 121 Charing Cross Road, but not what might perhaps be called the negative eccentricities. The St. Jacques booksellers are also biased, of course.
Similarly, the actual ancient yew, village, and church of Totteridge, and whoever was vicar in 1983, are not the same as in this book, which depicts an alternate, imagined 1983 and not the real places or persons.
I am eternally grateful to my wife, Anna McFarlane, who not only manages a very busy career as a publisher, but also our family; and to our sons, Thomas and Edward, who are very understanding of their father’s foibles and limitations, so often related to at least half my mind being absent in a book.
About the Author
PHOTO CREDIT WENDY MCDOUGALL
GARTH NIX is the New York Times bestselling author of the Old Kingdom series, beginning with Sabriel, and many other fantasy novels for teens and children, including the Seventh Tower series and the Keys to the Kingdom series. More than six million copies of his books have been sold worldwide and his work has been translated into forty-two languages. You can find him online at www.garthnix.com.
Discover great authors, exclusive offers, and more at hc.com.
Books by Garth Nix
THE OLD KINGDOM SERIES
Sabriel
Lirael
Abhorsen
Clariel
Goldenhand
The Old Kingdom Collection
To Hold the Bridge
Across the Wall: A Tale of the Abhorsen and Other Stories
The Creature in the Case: An Old Kingdom Novella
The Ragwitch
One Beastly Beast: Two Aliens, Three Inventors, Four Fantastic Tales
Shade’s Children
A Confusion of Princes
Newt’s Emerald
Angel Mage
The Left-Handed Booksellers of London
Back Ad
DISCOVER
your next favorite read
MEET
new authors to love
WIN
free books
SHARE
infographics, playlists, quizzes, and more
WATCH
the latest videos
www.epicreads.com
Copyright
Katherine Tegen Books is an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers.
THE LEFT-HANDED BOOKSELLERS OF LONDON. Copyright © 2020 by Garth Nix. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
www.epicreads.com
Cover art ©2020 by Leo Nickolls
Cover design by David Curtis
Library of Congress Control Number: 2020937197
Digital Edition SEPTEMBER2020 ISBN: 978-0-06-268327-4
Print ISBN: 978-0-06-268325-0
ISBN 978-0-06-305081-5 (int.)
2021222324PC/LSCH10987654321
FIRST EDITION
About the Publisher
Australia
HarperCollins Publishers Australia Pty. Ltd.
Level 13, 201 Elizabeth Street
Sydney, NSW 2000, Australia
www.harpercollins.com.au
Canada
HarperCollins Publishers Ltd
Bay Adelaide Centre, East Tower
22 Adelaide Street West, 41st Floor
Toronto, Ontario, M5H 4E3
www.harpercollins.ca
India
HarperCollins India
A 75, Sector 57
Noida
Uttar Pradesh 201 301
www.harpercollins.co.in
New Zealand
HarperCollins Publishers New Zealand
Unit D1, 63 Apollo Drive
Rosedale 0632
Auckland, New Zealand
www.harpercollins.co.nz
United Kingdom
HarperCollins Publishers Ltd.
1 London Bridge Street
London SE1 9GF, UK
www.harpercollins.co.uk
United States
HarperCollins Publishers Inc.
195 Broadway
New York, NY 10007
www.harpercollins.com
