Cover Stories: Diana, Princess of Wales; John Fowles; Squirrel Nutkin

It seems that Diana, Princess of Wales, was indeed about to write a book when she died in 1997. But far from being a no-holds-barred account of life within the royal family, it would have been a book about her charity work. According to agent Vivienne Schuster of Curtis Brown, it was planned as a launchpad for a new "career". The Princess was to have worked with Martin Bashir and Gail Rebuck, CEO of Random House, who agreed a "whopping, absolutely whopping" sum for world rights. Schuster was still negotiating the deal when Diana left for her final holiday. "I couldn't bring myself to throw the contract away," she said.

It's been a while since we've heard from John Fowles, author of (among other novels) The French Lieutenant's Woman. But this August, Cape will publish the first of two volumes of journals. The Oxford-educated former school teacher began keeping a diary in 1949 and has since written more than five million words. Together, the two published volumes will comprise around 10 per cent of that.

Squirrel Nutkin qualifies for a telegram from the Queen this year. The furry favourite is two years younger than Beatrix Potter's eldest, Peter Rabbit, and publisher Frederick Warne will begin celebrating his centenary with a limited edition of The Tale of Squirrel Nutkin, leather-boxed and costing £100.