A decent man

I read with great sadness in the Daily Telegraph this morning of the death of Tom Guinzburg. Tom, as head of Viking Press in the US, published my second book, Shall We Tell The President?, and gave me an advance of $400,000, which saved me from bankruptcy. A year later, he decided to sell his shares in Viking and join Penguin as a 33% shareholder. Within hours of the deal being signed, Penguin locked his office and sacked him. Tom lived for publishing, and it was a cruel and despicable act. What the Telegraph didn't report is that a few weeks earlier, Tom had purchased Kane and Abel, also for $400,000, and was looking forward to publishing the book a few months later. When I turned up in New York to discuss the details of a promotional tour, the new CEO of Penguin made it clear that they felt Guinzburg had paid too much for the book. My then agent, the shrewd Deborah Owen, told me that you should never be published by a house that is not 100% enthusiastic about your work. We agreed to tear up the contract - which pleased Penguin. Three weeks later, at an auction organised by Deborah, Simon & Schuster purchased Kane and Abel for $2,200,000. It went to No.1 on the NY Times Bestsellers List, and sold over 10 million copies in the US. Tom and I used to chuckle over supper whenever I was in New York, as he felt this was the best sort of revenge. He was a fine and decent man, and will be missed by all those who knew him in publishing, and those who simply enjoyed a glass of red wine with a civilised man.