FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: March 1, 2019 – Toronto

Shaftesbury has acquired screen rights for Undercard the debut novel by Toronto based author David Albertyn. House of Anansi Press published Undercard earlier this month. Set over the course of twenty-four exhilarating hours, Undercard is the story of four childhood friends, now in their early thirties, unexpectedly reunited by a high-profile prizefight in a Las Vegas casino . . . and an even higher-profile murder. The deal was negotiated by Michael Levine, Chairman of Westwood Creative Artists. Publishing rights for Undercard have already sold to Dreamscape Media (World English Audio), HarperCollins Germany (German), and HarperCollins France (World French).

“Fast-paced, fearless, and psychologically astute, Undercard is at once a terrific thriller and a sharp commentary on our turbulent times.” — David Bezmozgis, author of The Free World and The Betrayers

Born in Durban, South Africa, DAVID ALBERTYN immigrated to Canada with his family when he was ten years old. Since 2005, Albertyn has been a competitive tennis player and coach. A graduate of Queen’s University and the Humber School for Writers, Albertyn lives in Toronto. Undercard is his first novel.

HOUSE OF ANANSI PRESS was founded in 1967 by writers Dennis Lee and David Godfrey. Anansi started as a small press with a mandate to publish Canadian writers, and quickly gained attention for publishing authors such as Margaret Atwood, Matt Cohen, Michael Ondaatje, and Erín Moure, as well as George Grant and Northrop Frye. French-Canadian works in translation have always been an important part of the list, and prominent Anansi authors in translation include Roch Carrier, Marie-Claire Blais, Anne Hébert, and France Daigle. Today, the company specializes in finding and developing writers of literary fiction, poetry, drama, and nonfiction, including Katherena Vermette, Lisa Moore, Patrick deWitt, Tanya Talaga, Djamila Ibrahim, Kathleen Winter, and Leanne Betasamosake Simpson, and in maintaining the culturally significant backlist that has accumulated in the decades since the house was founded.