Cover Reveal for Olivia Laing's THE SILVER BOOK

It is with great pleasure and the help of a curtain-pulling video that we reveal the cover of Olivia Laing's new novel (their second) The Silver Book, which will be published in the UK by Hamish Hamilton on 6 November. 

It is September 1974. Two men meet by chance in Venice. One is a young English artist, in panicked flight from London. The other is Danilo Donati, the magician of Italian cinema, the designer responsible for realising the spectacular visions of Fellini and Pasolini. Donati is in Venice to produce sketches for Fellini’s Casanova. A young – and beautiful – apprentice is just what he needs.

The Silver Book is at once a queer love story and a noirish thriller, set in the dream factory of cinema. It’s a fictional account of real things, and an investigation into the difficult relationship between artifice and truth, illusion and reality, love and power.

The photograph used on the cover has been an inspiration to the novel since Olivia started writing it, and has now been made into a beautiful jacket design by Penguin designer Richard Bravery. Hamish Hamilton will be creating special editions for various retailers, and you can pre-order from various retailers here.

The events being lined up for this publication are great. I'm really looking forward to thinking a lot about Pasolini in November. But also for readers to discover this incredible novel - both utterly different from, and all of a piece with, everything else that Olivia has written.

Bound proofs are available soon and Olivia's publicist at Hamish Hamilton is Chloe Davies: cdavies1@penguinrandomhouse.co.uk 

More info on Olivia’s website.