Zaffre, the flagship commercial fiction imprint of Bonnier Books UK, has acquired Secret Dinner and one further novel by bestselling author Raphael Montes in a competitive pre-empt.
Commissioning Editor Kasim Mohammed acquired UK and Commonwealth rights, excluding Canada, from Una McKeown at Susanna Lea Associates. Secret Dinner will be released in August 2026 and published in the US by Ryan Doherty, Celadon Books. The book has been translated by Zoë Alexandra Perry.
Raphael Montes is Brazil’s most prominent thriller writer. He is best known for Secret Dinner, (Jantar Secreto), which was published in Brazil in 2016. The book is a dark and provocative thriller set in Rio de Janeiro. When Dante and his friends can’t make their rent, they decide to use their culinary skills and host a dinner with a high price tag because of an unusual menu item… human.
Secret Dinner has sold over 300,000 copies and established Raphael as one of the most compelling voices in contemporary crime fiction in Brazil. In total, he has written eight critically acclaimed novels, which have sold over one million copies and are published in more than twenty-five countries. As a screenwriter, Raphael has written TV shows for Netflix and Amazon Prime, as well as writing the highest-streaming original TV show on HBO Max Latam.
Raphael Montes said: ‘I am thrilled that Secret Dinner will be published in the UK, the birthplace of crime fiction and the modern thriller, and with the brilliant Kasim Mohammed and team at Zaffre. It is an honor to bring a Brazilian story with such universal themes into this rich literary tradition.’
Kasim Mohammed said: ‘I was all the way in from the moment that I started to read the sample of Secret Dinner after it appeared in my inbox. Raphael is a wonderful writer to work with and I can’t wait to bring this funny, gory, brilliant book to the UK.’
Secret Dinner will be published in Paperback Original, eBook and Audiobook 6th August 2026.
