Sceptre

About Sceptre

Sceptre is the literary fiction and non-fiction imprint of Hodder & Stoughton, launched in London in 1986 and now part of Hachette UK.

Hodder & Stoughton created Sceptre in 1986 to publish literary titles alongside its mass-market imprints Coronet and NEL. Its stated aim is original fiction and non-fiction that provokes thought and surprises readers. The imprint's ownership has followed Hodder's: in 1993 Headline bought Hodder & Stoughton to form Hodder Headline, which later passed to Hachette Livre, so Sceptre now sits inside Hachette UK.

Sceptre is closely associated with David Mitchell. It published Cloud Atlas in hardback in 2004 (ISBN 0-340-82277-5), a novel shortlisted for the Booker Prize, and The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet in 2010; Mitchell's number9dream was also Booker-shortlisted. Other Sceptre authors include Andrew Miller, whose Pure (2011) won the Costa Prize, Chris Cleave (The Other Hand, 2008), Ned Beauman (Boxer, Beetle, 2010), Siri Hustvedt and Jenn Ashworth. Sceptre began as a paperback-only list, and its early titles included a paperback of Thomas Keneally's Booker-winning Schindler's Ark, first published in 1982 before the imprint existed; it later published Charles Frazier's Cold Mountain in 1997.