Footnote Press bags ‘luminous’ group biography of ‘forgotten communist radicals’ from Casey

Footnote Press has signed Hotel Lux: An Intimate History of World Revolution, a “luminous” group biography of the “forgotten communist radicals” who found friendship at a Moscow Hotel in the 1920s, from Maurice Casey.

Commissioning editor Rose Green acquired world English-language rights, including audio, from Donald Winchester at Watson, Little. The book will be published in autumn 2024.

Hotel Lux follows three revolutionary families–the O’Flahertys, Cohens and Leonhards–who were brought together by their shared vision of a communist future. The group biography is a “multi-generational rebel odyssey” which offers “an intimate insight into the legacies of the Russian Revolution” from its beginnings to the Stalinist purges and beyond and builds towards the love story between the daughters of the Cohens and Leonhards.

Green said: “From the outset, I was struck by Maurice’s determination to draw a hopeful conclusion from a period of history fraught with tragedy, brutality and crushed ideals […] within its pages I found a history of international communism wrapped up in the lives and loves of a group of remarkable and sadly overlooked people. I am thrilled that Maurice has entrusted me with his fascinating book and with the stories of the figures within it.”

Casey commented: “I have followed this story of global revolutionary dreams and the extraordinary people who pursued them through archives across the world (including the Comintern archives in Moscow and a radical family archive that I traced to a garden shed in northern Spain). I knew from my first meeting with editor Rose Green that Footnote Press has the enthusiasm, ambition and vision required to bring this story of passionate and dangerous lives to reader.”