The latest snippet about Vol 3 from The Bookseller.
John Murray is to publish a posthumous book by travel writer Patrick Leigh Fermor, who died in June [Edit – the article says July – good research!!].
by Benedicte Page
First published in The Bookseller, 16 December 2011
The book will complete the story of the journey Leigh Fermor made on foot from the Hook of Holland to Constantinople at the age of 18, as told in his previous works A Time of Gifts and Between the Woods and the Water. The currently untitled volume will be published in September 2013.
Artemis Cooper, whose biography of Leigh Fermor will be published in September 2012, said: “By the end of the second volume, he was about to cross the Danube from Romania and plunge into Bulgaria; and his devoted readership have been stuck midstream, as it were, for over 20 years. A painstaking perfectionist, Leigh Fermor never did finish the final volume though he was working on it up to his death in June 2011.”
Based on the original diary he kept at the time and an early draft of the book written in the 1960s, this book takes up the story, and carries the reader to Constantinople and beyond.
John Murray m.d. Roland Philipps said: “I was told of the existence of a manuscript on the day that Sir Patrick died in June of this year, and read it shortly afterwards. It is a treat to be back, immersed once again in this great pre-War walk across Europe and wonderful for his many admirers that this book will be published.”
The publisher describes Leigh Fermor as “one of the outstanding prose stylists of modern time”.
Patrick Leigh Fermor 
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Further confirmation – http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2011/dec/20/patrick-leigh-fermor-final-volume
How brilliant – made my Christmas! I have been waiting for this for decades. PLF has really influenced my life and my writings!
BRITAIN’S LEADING NON-FICTION WRITER!!!! Having a trawl around The Bookseller I found this amusing piece …. Tom Weldon, chief executive of Penguin, pointed out that last year’s Oliver title had 280 pages and this year’s has 400, an increase of about 40%. “I think £30 represents fantastic value. This is a 400-page book from Britain’s leading non-fiction writer,” he said.
I spoke to Artemis on Thursday last and said there were two questions people were asking. Without further ado she said Xmas 2012 for the biography and the following year for the last of the trilogy. I think it is as you suggest Tom, largely the practicalities of getting all the work for the two books into a format for the publishers.Anyone who has seen Paddy’s draft’s will know they represent a ‘challenge’ for publishers but show what a perfectionist he was.
Very welcome news, of course, if not unexpected. But why the surprisingly long delay, to September 2013? The implication could be that the manuscript needs a considerable amount of editing, but that doesn’t sound like a “painstakingly perfectionist” Paddy. A marketing decision? If so, an odd one.
John – much work required and I believe Artemis will work on it. She already has the deadline for the biography for Spring 2012 – no conspriracy just practicalities I guess.