Writer scoops £500,000 debut deal!

A first time author who spent more than 30 years planning his work has scooped what is understood to be the largest ever advance for a British debut novel - around £500,000.

The Meaning Of Night by Michael Cox was snapped up by publishers John Murray last week after a frenzied telephone bidding war. He said today: "I'm still in a state of shock.".

Mr Cox, 55, first dreamed up his story in his twenties - and has been planning it ever since. But it was only when the aspiring novelist learned that cancer threatened his eyesight that he determined to put pen to paper.

The novel is a murder-mystery set in Victorian London which starts with a seemingly motiveless murder and snowballs into a complicated tale of suspense.

After so many years of contemplation and planning, it took Mr Cox only about six months to write The Meaning Of Night. He said: "This novel has been in my head - and in my dreams for over 30 years and it's amazing to me that my illness, which I have lived with for so long, gave me the opportunity to finally get it down on paper. The reaction to it has exceeded my wildest authorial fantasies."

Mr Cox, who lives in Northamptonshire, was first diagnosed with cancer in 1992 and took early retirement from Oxford University Press, where he was an editor, in 2002.

While working, his lifelong passion for Victorian literature fired him to edit a number of collections including The Oxford Book Of Victorian Ghost Stories and

The Oxford Book Of Victorian Detective Stories. His debut novel has been bought by John Murray's fiction editor, Anya Serota, who will publish it next September.

Miss Serota told the Standard: "I received the manuscripts early last Monday evening and I just couldn't put it down. I read nonstop and finished 2am.

"The next day was spent getting copies to the people here at John Murray and we put our first bid in on Tuesday. It is an absolute classic, a real literary mystery full of passion and intrigue. It has everything."