My slow conquest of the world continues, nation by nation and language by language.
Just signed contracts for an Icelandic edition of Ice & Fire, the first time I’ll be published in that language, and now my agent informs me that he’s closed a deal for a Persian (Farsi) edition as well… a first for him as well as me.
WILD CARDS is marching on as well, with new deals for the first seven books in Mexico and Russia.
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For my readers in Portugal… some details of my visit there…
See you in Lisbon! See you in Porto!
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Sorry, Portugal.
When I put up the post about my Portuguese publisher winning the gold medal for being the first to release a translation of A DANCE WITH DRAGONS (see below), a number of readers in Croatia wrote me to say, no, the Croatian edition was out first. I had not seen the Croatian edition, or even a jpeg of its cover… but now I have.
They were right. Croatia was first. Portugal was second. Croatia gets the gold, Portugal the silver. (The bronze remains to be determined, so far as I know). Both Croatia and Portugal split the book into two volumes, and have thusfar released only the first half.
Here’s the Croatian cover for volume one of DANCE:
And here’s their cover for the second part, which is not yet published, but is in the pipeline and should be out soon:
Meanwhile, filming of the second season of the HBO series in currently underway in Dubrovnik, so Croatia is doubly blessed. A lot of Croatians have been hired as extras and crew, and a few have speaking roles as well.
Portugal, on the other hand, gets a visit from me next spring.
So everybody wins. I hope.
Enjoy the read, whatever language you may be reading in.
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… in Portugal.
The first translation of A DANCE WITH DRAGONS is just out. And the gold medal for fastest translation goes to Portugal.
Mind you, my Portugese publisher splits each book into two volumes, so this is only the first half of DANCE… but even so, the first volume is in the bookshops, and I’m told it has vaulted to the top of the Portugese bestseller lists.
(cover art by Andreas Rocha)
So… which country will get the silver medal? Spain? Italy? Germany? Your guess is as good as mine, but I’ll keep you posted.
Meanwhile, back in the States, DANCE fell to #3 on the NYTimes list last week, and this week is down to #4. But still in the top ten, nine weeks after publication.
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Here’s a new interview with me… for those of you who speak Polish.
http://e.czaskultury.pl/czytanka/rozmowy/718-nikt-nie-chce-sie-znalezc-w-prologu
At this stage, fifty interviews later, I have no idea what I said.
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Just flipped over the page on my World Wildlife Fund calendar (a day late, sue me), and was amused to see that the featured animals for July are gorillas. Nothing could be more fitting for the month in which Kong is finally loosed upon the reading public. heh
On other fronts… I mentioned below that WARRIORS won the Locus Award as the best anthology of 2010, which pleased me no end… but I forgot to mention that Gardner Dozois and I have just signed with Tor for a sequel of sorts. A mammoth crossgenre book featuring contributions from an all-star lineup of award-winning writers and bestsellers from half a dozen different genres and subgenres. This one has the working title DANGEROUS WOMEN. Whether that will be the final title or not, I am less sure. Must admit, I do not love it; too generic for my taste. I wanted to call the book FEMMES FATALE, but our editor suggested that no one younger than forty would have any idea what that phrase meant. Which boggles the hell out of me, but what do I know? Could be we’ll settle on WOMEN WARRIORS. Though that’s limiting in a different sort of way. But whatever title it goes by in the end, it should be a helluva anthology. We have some great writers lined up, as we did with WARRIORS.
And yes, DANGEROUS WOMEN will include the fourth Dunk & Egg novella, the long-promised tale of their visit to the North, where they encounter the She-Wolves of Winterfell. I could tell you more than that, but then I’d need to kill you.
Meanwhile, Ice & Fire continues its slow conquest of the world, nation by nation and language by language. I’ve just signed a deal for Turkish editions, and we’re negotiating with a Vietnamese publisher as well.
And my US book tour is coming up fast, so these days have been busy ones. At the moment I am finishing up the first draft of my script for the second season of the HBO series, hammering out the overplot of the new Wild Cards book LOWBALL, and of course doing what seems like ten interviews a day. Would that there were four of me.
These are exciting days.
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Some highlights from my recent visit to Slovenia. From Aljaž PotoÄnik, who followed us around for most of the day.
http://www.dnevnik.si/novice/kultura/1042454378
The news article is in Slovenian, but the video features me speaking English. (What else? That’s all I speak). Bits from my introductory Slovenian press conference and my signing in Koper (the small one, not the monstrous one in Ljubljana) are included… along with highlights of my visit to the amazing Predjama Castle, which appears to double as the Slovenian version of Graumann’s Chinese Theatre as well as being an astonishing fortress-in-a-cave.
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Another snowy day in Santa Fe. Winter has bloody well come, and refuses to leave.
Yesterday’s SUICIDE KINGS signing at Barnes & Noble in Albuquerque went well, I think. We had a nice, enthusiastic crowd and signed a lot of books. Poor Vic Milan came down with some sort of creeping crud and had to cancel, but Carrie Vaughn, Caroline Spector, John Jos. Miller, Ian Tregillis, Melinda M. Snodgrass, Daniel Abraham, and yours truly were all on hand, defacing books. We signed a considerable amount of stock as well, so if you’re looking for an autographed title by any of the above, contact B&N at Coronado Center.
(photos by Parris)
Speaking of Wild Cards, we have some good news for my Italian fans. I’ve just signed contracts for Italian language translations of the first three volumes of the series (WILD CARDS, ACES HIGH, and JOKERS WILD). The publisher will be RCS Libri. Needless to say, if these books do well, the rest of the series will follow in good tine.
On other fronts, I’m going to be coming to Minnesota in November. Fantasy Flight Games is bringing me in as a special guest for ‘Days of Ice and Fire,’ a weekend-long celebration of Westeros at FFG’s new Events Center in Roseville, MN. FFG will be running tournaments for their Ice & Fire card game and board games, and I’ll be doing a Q&A, several signing sessions, and maybe a reading from A DANCE WITH DRAGONS. More details can be found on FF’s own site at http://www.fantasyflightgames.com/edge_news.asp?eidn=1120 We’ll know more about the schedule when we get closer to the event.
Another visit to a big midwestern city is in the works as well, and much sooner than the FFG event, but I can’t talk about that one yet. Watch this space. Announcement soon.
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My books are published all over the world, in many different languages. Sometimes my foreign publishers just re-use the cover art from my American and/or British editions. Sometimes they slap on something vaguely appropriate (or not) from the Big Box o’ Bad Fantasy Art down in their cellars. But sometimes they commission brand new cover art, often from artists in their own countries. (And that’s certainly my preference, whenever I get a vote).
The quality varies, of course, just as it does with American and British covers. Sometimes good, sometimes not so good, sometimes downright hideous… but every once in a while, we get something spectacular. And I’ve been very pleased with some of the covers I’ve seen recently, so I thought I would share them with those of you who enjoy pretty figures.
First, from Estonia, a wonderful new FEVRE DREAM cover. Varrak, my Estonian publisher, really pulled out all the stops on this. I love the look of a classic antebellum steamboat, and the artist here actually got it right and gave me a sidewheeler, not a sternwheeler.
Meanwhile, in France, my French publishers are repackaging and reissuing all the books in A SONG OF ICE AND FIRE in new one-volumed editions (previously the French translations have been divided into three or four parts), with stunning new covers by Marc Simonetti. Here a couple of them: his takes on the Wall and Tyrion in King’s Landing.
You can check out almost every cover that I’ve ever had on “Cover Art” page of my website (click on second shield on the bottom, black and green, House Fell)… though admittedly I’m a little behind on updating the gallery.
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