Cover Stories: London Book Fair; Charmian Hussey's new book

Jordan and Lord Brocket aside, the London Book Fair this week was largely devoid of ridiculous flummery.

Jordan and Lord Brocket aside, the London Book Fair this week was largely devoid of ridiculous flummery. Inevitably, the snappers jostled for the best view of Katie Price, whose memoir, Being Jordan, has finally found a publisher. She has wound up among friends on the Blake Publishing list. Her I'm a Celebrity... Tarzan, Lord Brocket, will meanwhile recount his colourful past for Simon & Schuster, where he will keep better company.

Otherwise, the three-day event at Olympia, now second in importance to Frankfurt, was a businesslike affair. For visiting Americans, the weak dollar made an expensive fair even more pricey, but it gave them a significant edge when it came to dealing with the "open-market" territories where the US and UK always jostle for supremacy. The feeble greenback does however mean that many projects are getting cheaper by the day. HarperCollins won world rights to the joint autobiography of U2, which will be written with a little help from Rolling Stone journalist Jim Henke. The agent, natch, was Ed Victor and the deal is thought to be worth about $3m - which, pretty soon, may be the equivalent of only £1.5m. Though not a word has been written, the book's already looking like a bargain. It will appear next year amid the silver-jubilee hoopla of a world tour and a new album for Bono and co.

* Charmian Hussey's self-published children's novel, The Valley of Secrets, hit the headlines as copies changed hands on the internet for £2,000. This week it was sold to a mainstream publisher. Peter Straus, once the man behind Picador and now an agent with the much-respected Rogers, Coleridge & White, has sold the fantasy at auction to Hodder for "a very substantial sum". Editor Anne McNeil calls it " Swallows and Amazons meets The Secret Garden meets Great Expectations". Inevitably, Hodder hopes for the next Harry Potter. Come this autumn, we will find out.