I am very very very proud to announce that Bluebird (part of Macmillan) will be republishing Cooking On A Bootstrap after Christmas, so if you didn?t grab a copy in the Kickstarter, you?ll soon be able to get it from any good bookshop(!!!)
To my 4,377 backers, I was sitting in the British Library sobbing fat tears on a Rare Books And Manuscripts Desk (from which I hastily moved my 500-year-old cookery tomes before I dissolve them in snot) as I typed this a few days ago. Please know that this would not have happened without you, and what great things your support has done, and how thankful I am for you all getting me back on my feet.
? Backers will receive one of my kickstarter copies, which will be limited editions, six months before general release.
? 1 in 4 of these, thanks to you, are headed for libraries, schools, refuges and people on pensions, benefits and low incomes.
? I HAVE A PROPER BOOK DEAL AND IT?S COZ YOU ALL BELIEVED IN ME AND IT?S REALLY HARD TO CRY QUIETLY IN A LIBRARY.
With thanks to Carole at Bluebird, Charlie and Rosamund for gentle introductions, Rosemary for letting me fly with my batshit ideas, Adrian for everything that?s got me to here, and everyone I sent my proposal to who told me to dust myself off and go for it.
(With no thanks to the publisher who pulled my original book deal after I came out: I guess like I said, I don?t cook with my chromosomes. Or my bra. I cook with my boots on and my motherfucking heart.)
ONWARDS. I GOT A BOOK TO WRITE.
XXXXX
PS here?s the official press release:
?Pan Macmillan has bought world rights for food writer and campaigner Jack Monroe?s third book Cooking on a Bootstrap.
The book comprises 100 ?affordable? recipes and is the sequel to the first cookbook A Girl Called Jack (Michael Joseph). It will include chapters on breads and breakfasts, super soups, beans, pulses and lentils, as well as new additions such as ?eat your greens? and ?don?t throw that away?, encompassing tips on using leftovers.
The title was originally launched on Kickstarter in December, and met its original £8,000 funding target in just one day. Those backers will receive a limited print run of a special edition from Monroe to be released this spring.
At the time Monroe did not explain the decision to self-fund the project after being published by Michael Joseph for the first two cookbooks, but said on the Kickstarter page that ?I?ve stripped it back from the gorgeous gloss that was book two, as beautiful as it was, the glass slipper didn?t quite fit my budget foot, so I?m going back to basics.? However, Monroe said it now ?felt right? to take the book to a wider audience.
Bluebird publisher Carole Tonkinson acquired world rights from Rosemary Scoular at United Agents. Monroe said their Nan would be helping to copy edit the book and a group of people on benefits and large families would be helping to test the recipes.
Monroe said: ?When I first launched the Kickstarter it was intended to be a tiny run; I just wanted a way to deliver Bootstrap to the people who wanted it. That initial target was met in the first 24 hours, and the more people who pledged for it, the more I was able to open it up to people who needed it.
?Backers generously subsidised copies for schools, libraries, and people on low incomes and on benefits, including students and pensioners and by the end 1 in 4 of those sold were subsidised copies. I thought that would be the end of it, and then I got the message from Bluebird.
?I?m overwhelmed by the support for this. It?s still a tiny operation; my nan is my copy editor and I have a bunch of busy people, people on benefits and single parents and large families testing my recipes for me. I?m glad to be doing this my way. Bluebird has been incredibly supportive, and it just feels right to make it available to a wider audience.?
It will be published as a trade paperback and e-book in January 2017.?