Simon & Schuster Acquires Fox McLeod's Fiction Debut

6 February 2025 - Publishers Marketplace

Simon & Schuster Australia (S&S) has acquired world rights to Rachel Fox McLeod's commercial women's fiction debut, Disgraceful, in a deal between S&S commercial fiction publisher Cassandra Di Bello and Anjanette Fennell at Key People Literary Management.

The book will contemplate 'starting life over in your forties' according to the author, who said that she 'wanted to explore all the things we're not supposed to talk about as women ... the feelings we hide, the fears we have, the hopes for ourselves we keep contained'. Di Bello added that the novel is 'about women reclaiming agency and what to do when the world tells you you're too old', in a story described as 'hilarious and brimming with heart and hope'.

McLeod said of Disgraceful: 'Women wants to read authentic stories that are brutally honest about being a woman - the complexities of motherhood, difficult family dynamics, our changing bodies and sex - especially as we get older. We're expected to fulfil so many different roles for other people - our partners, children, parents, even friends - often losing ourselves in the process. Figuring out who we are outside those expectations - how to be the truest version of ourselves and how to really live - is equal parts exciting and terrifying. And sometimes you've just got to laugh.'

Disgraceful will be released in Australia and New Zealand on 28 April 2026, to be in bookstores and online for May.