HarperCollins acquires Orgias’ debut crime novel

HarperCollins Publishers Australia has acquired ANZ rights to Teeth Kicker, the debut crime novel by Glenn Orgias, in a deal brokered by Jeanne Ryckmans of Key People Literary Management.

‘Set on the bent and brutal streets of Newcastle in the 1990s, Teeth Kicker tells the story of 22-year-old Vincent Silk, who is forced to pay his way out of crippling debt by becoming an enforcer to an unhinged loan shark,’ said the publisher.

Raised on the Central Coast of NSW, Orgias is the author of Man in a Grey Suit (Penguin, 2012), a memoir which details his survival of a shark attack in 2009. His fiction writing has appeared in many literary journals including SmokeLong Quarterly, Wigleaf, Pithead Chapel. He has been nominated for the Best Small Fictions and the Pushcart Prize.

Orgias said, ‘My love of books started as a teenager when I first read my dad’s collection of Robert Ludlum thrillers, so to get my own novel published is an incredible thrill. I’m so pleased that this story, set in Newcastle, a place dear to me, has found a home at HarperCollins.’

Fiction and nonfiction publisher Roberta Ivers said, ‘Take Animal Kingdom and Mr InBetween and smash it into Gabriel Bergmoser’s The Hunted and you might get close – it’s so dark and edgy and thrilling, and packed with characters that will stay with you forever, all told with a voice that’s so electrifying that I stayed up and finished the manuscript in a night. I was totally on edge but also moved to tears and everything in between.’

HarperCollins plans to release Teeth Kicker in September 2026.

Category: Local news News Rights and acquisitions