Lynne Reid Banks Lynne Reid Banks Lynne Reid Banks (born 31 July 1929) is a British author of books for children and adults. She has written forty-five books, including the best-selling children's novel "The Indian in the Cupboard", which has sold over 10 million copies and has been successfully adapted to film. Her first novel, "The L-Shaped Room", published in 1960, was an instant and lasting best seller. It was later made into a movie of the same name and led to two sequels, "The Backward Shadow" and "Two is Lonely". Banks also wrote a biography of the Brontë family, entitled "Dark Quartet",
Debut novel sales are anticipated, the advance can be larger. For an example of an unusually high advance: in 2013, the highly anticipated "City on Fire" by Garth Risk Hallberg captured the attention of ten publishers who started a bidding war that ended with Knopf buying the rights to the book for 2 million dollars. The book's film production rights were purchased soon after by producer Scott Rudin. For similar reasons that advances are frequently not very large—novels frequently don't sell well until the author gains a literary reputation. There are exceptions, however; YouTube star Zoella published her debut novel "Girl Online"