Pan Macmillan to publish Steph McGovern’s debut crime novel
Deadline will be published in hardback in July 2025.
Pan Macmillan have acquired the debut crime novel, Deadline, from award winning broadcaster and Theakston’s Crime Novel of the Year judge Steph McGovern.
Deadline centres around Rose, a young broadcaster who is preparing to interview one of the most powerful men in the country. But as the live TV interview begins, she hears an unfamiliar voice in her earpiece telling her that her family have been kidnapped, and she must do exactly as the hijacker says in order to keep them safe.
‘Steph has written a pacy, witty, engaging thriller, entertaining and delightfully authentic, but hard-hitting and thought-provoking too. I can't wait for you all to read it.’
Ann Cleeves
Steph McGovern is an award-winning broadcaster who currently presents The Rest is Money podcast with Robert Peston. Steph has worked in journalism for over twenty years, eight of which as part of the BBC Breakfast family. She went on to present her own BAFTA nominated live daily show, Steph’s Packed Lunch, on Channel 4 and is a regular Have I Got News for You panellist and host. Steph is an avid crime reader and has interviewed countless authors including Val McDermid, Ann Cleeves, Hillary Clinton, Harlan Coben, Lee Child and Don Winslow, as well as judging the Theakston’s Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year award at the Harrogate Crime Festival since 2019.
‘As soon as I read Deadline, I knew this was the novel Steph was born to write. We are thrown into a high stakes suspense thriller with an authenticity on the world of broadcasting and politics that only she knows. I cannot wait for readers to discover Steph’s writing and the world of Deadline.’
Publisher Francesca Pathak
‘Deadline is a book idea I’ve had since my early days on breakfast TV. Writing it has given me the chance to spend the last few years secretly living in a parallel universe where the high-pressured, high profile environments I’ve worked in, and the colourful characters I’ve met along the way, have all fed into my own invented dark story of power, corruption and lies.’
Steph McGovern
Deadline
by Steph McGovern
Your child has been kidnapped. You're live on television.
Going live in 10, 9, 8. . .Today is a huge day for TV reporter Rose’s career. A live interview with one of the most powerful men in the country, on one of the nation’s biggest TV shows.
7, 6, 5. . . But when she hears an unfamiliar voice in her ear, she knows something is very wrong.
4, 3, 2. . . Her earpiece has been hacked. She’s live on air in the middle of the interview. They tell her they have kidnapped her family.
1. . . And in order to protect them, Rose must do exactly what the hijacker says. . . they are in control now.
Author photo credit: Carolyn Mendelsohn