Salman Rushdie to publish memoir of his fatwah years

BOoker Prize-winning author Salman Rushdie - who was forced into hiding because of an Islamic death order, or fatwah - is to publish his memoirs.

Mr Rushdie, author of The Satanic Verses, a title ruled blasphemous by Iranian cleric Ayatollah Khomeini in 1979, has signed a worldwide deal with Random House for the book, which will be published in 2012.

His memoir will tackle his marriages, his experience as an "outsider" at public school and his years of internal exile.

Random House described the deal as "one of the most far-reaching multinational and multi-language book publishing deals by one publisher for a single title".

It will be simultaneously published around the world in book, digital and audio formats.