I buy a lot of secondhand books, and recently acquired The Cassiopeia Affair. I think it would make a great radio script, maybe an hour long. BBC Radio 4 fodder.
My google-fu has managed to reveal that one of the authors died in 1986, and no information on the other. Obviously, the book is still in copyright. Further google-fu gives me Gollancz SF as one of the publishers (my copy is from the Science Fiction Book Club).
I was going to contact Gollancz to see if anyone knew who currently held the rights, but their rights page asks for a lot of detail. It's obviously set up for extensive non-fair-use quotes, rather than derivative works. I haven't written anything yet; I wanted to find out the status of the rights first to see whether it was worth spending the time on it. I don't even know if Gollancz hold them. If they're reverted to the writer's estates, then I'm reliant on Gollancz to pass on my request (since they explicitly state they don't pass on authors' details) because I can't find any other leads.
So, thoughts? I don't know if it's worth firing off a quick enquiry now, or writing the script first and going from there. Does anyone know of any other way to hunt down who might have the rights?
My google-fu has managed to reveal that one of the authors died in 1986, and no information on the other. Obviously, the book is still in copyright. Further google-fu gives me Gollancz SF as one of the publishers (my copy is from the Science Fiction Book Club).
I was going to contact Gollancz to see if anyone knew who currently held the rights, but their rights page asks for a lot of detail. It's obviously set up for extensive non-fair-use quotes, rather than derivative works. I haven't written anything yet; I wanted to find out the status of the rights first to see whether it was worth spending the time on it. I don't even know if Gollancz hold them. If they're reverted to the writer's estates, then I'm reliant on Gollancz to pass on my request (since they explicitly state they don't pass on authors' details) because I can't find any other leads.
So, thoughts? I don't know if it's worth firing off a quick enquiry now, or writing the script first and going from there. Does anyone know of any other way to hunt down who might have the rights?
