Image: Nick Tucker
Becky Hardie, Deputy Publishing Director at Chatto & Windus, has acquired rights in UK & Commonwealth territories (including Canada) to Kerry Hudson’s powerful new memoir NEWBORN from Juliet Pickering.
NEWBORN is a beautiful, empowering memoir about creating a family in the midst of chaos, and learning new ways to find happiness. It continues the journey Kerry started in her bestselling memoir LOWBORN, illuminating her experiences of becoming a mother, reshaping her future and reclaiming her identity.
Kerry Hudson is celebrated for her emotionally and politically powerful writing about growing up in poverty. Her books and journalism have changed the conversation and touched countless lives.
In this new book she asks: what next, after a childhood like hers? What hope is there of creating a different life for herself, let alone future generations? We see how Kerry found love, what it took to decide to start a family of her own and how fragile every step of the journey towards parenthood was. All along the way, she faces obstacles that would test the strongest foundations, from struggles with fertility to being locked down in a Prague maternity hospital to a marriage in crisis. But over and over again, her love, hope, fight – and determination to break patterns and give her son a different life – win through and light her path.
Kerry Hudson says: ‘As with LOWBORN, this continues the tradition of writing the book I needed to read myself. I know I am one of many who experiences the aftershocks of childhood deprivation and who has complicated or estranged relationships with their own mothers. I didn't have a map for motherhood or a blueprint for building a healthy family but in this book I explore how, with love, laughter and the hardest lessons, it is absolutely possible. Though I never say this, I'm very proud of this book. It's as candid as anything I've ever written and I hope it will, as LOWBORN did, find the readers who truly need it.'
Becky Hardie, Deputy Publishing Director of Chatto & Windus says: ‘Ever since Chatto published her first novel, we’ve watched as Kerry’s beautifully open and honest writing has reached and inspired more and more readers. She truly has changed lives, and the publishing industry. In this new book, she faces perhaps the biggest challenge yet: how to build a family when you don’t have a model to work from. As it turns out, this isn’t perhaps the biggest challenge, and she will need to draw more than ever on the adventurous spirit, resilience, sense of humour and empathy she is so celebrated for.’
Chatto & Windus will publish NEWBORN in hardback in Spring 2024.
About Kerry Hudson
Kerry Hudson was born in Aberdeen. Growing up in a succession of council estates, B&Bs and caravan parks provided her with a keen eye for idiosyncratic behaviour, material for life, and a love of travel.
Her first novel, TONY HOGAN BOUGHT ME AN ICE-CREAM FLOAT BEFORE HE STOLE MY MA (Chatto & Windus), was published in July 2012 and was shortlisted for eight literary prizes, including the Guardian First Book Award and Green Carnation Prize, and won Scottish First Book of the Year. Kerry’s second novel, THIRST, was developed with support from the National Lottery through an Arts Council England grant, and published by Chatto in July 2014 before being shortlisted for the Green Carnation Prize. Her first work of non-fiction, LOWBORN (2019) became a Times bestseller and was hailed as ‘One of the most important books of the year’ by The Guardian.
Published in France as La Couleur de L'eau by Editions Philippe Rey, translated by Florence Lévy-Paolini, THIRST was the winner of prestigious literary prize, Prix Femina Etranger 2015, going on to become a bestseller in France. It was also shortlisted for the European Strega prize in Italy, after being published there as SETE, by Minimum Fax.
Kerry also wrote the script for HANNAH, which was broadcast on BBC Four, starring Emma Fryer, as part of SKINT, a series of seven 15-minute monologues tackling the subject of poverty in the UK. HANNAH tells the story of a mother who is trying to do the best for her child whilst facing homelessness.
Kerry writes for various publications including The New York Times, Guardian, Big Issue and Press and Journal, and is a columnist for The Herald. In 2022 she was nominated for Columnist of the Year in the Regional Press Awards. In 2020, Kerry was elected as a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature.
She currently lives in Glasgow.
Praise for Kerry Hudson
‘A fearless writer, an inspiring woman’ – Jackie Annesley ― The Sunday Times
‘It’s not just Kerry Hudson’s writing that is vibrant, authentic and true, it’s the person herself, it’s where the writing comes from; a wise and generous heart.’ – Kit de Waal
‘There are few writers who use their work to shine a light on working class lives, and fewer still who use their success, as Kerry herself said recently in The Guardian, ‘to send the elevator back down’ to help those waiting in the basement to make their way up. Kerry Hudson is one of those writers who stands out for her empathy and passion and her tireless championing of the excluded.’ – Paul McVeigh
Follow Kerry on Twitter
