Big Books, Little Books
One of the most exciting things for authors is always the arrival of a package bringing their latest book/s. Or shiny new author copies.
Book deliveries have been a bit thin on the ground at my place over the past couple of years while I’ve been fully focused on writing and redrafting two historical novels, which, as much as writing these longer length works is my passion these days, also means a lot longer between celebratory bubbles. So it was especially exciting before Christmas to receive a BIG book version (426mm x 315mm) of my title The Barnyard Dance from Gilt Edge Publishing in New Zealand.
One of the things that drew me to write for Gilt Edge were their books’ gorgeous full colour illustrations and cover designs, and that, for some series, they produce BIG books. A large version for teachers to utilise.
I’ve always loved The Barnyard Dance because it’s a fun to read, rhyming story, beautifully illustrated by Richard Hoit. Now I think I love its BIG brother even more.
This post started out simply to herald a new book arriving – or new version – and the thrill of it, but it also led me to search out my other kid’s fiction titles and, taking a fresh peek, it’s pretty exciting to see how many of my educational titles have been re-published internationally in different versions and formats, including braille and audio. Some feature new covers/colours/designs, new titles or changes in spelling, and quite a few have been translated into French and sold into Canada.
Here’s a few pics of some of my titles that have travelled and changed, if you’d like to play Spot the Difference.
Dominic’s collections including a braille version
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Categories: Books Chris Bell books Picture Books
Tags: New books
elaineouston
Well done Chris. You certainly have an impressive array of titles there.
christinemareebell
Thank you, Elaine. It’s lovely to see how many have gone international. 🙂
Corinne Fenton
Wonderful news Chris. Congratulations and so lovely to have a matching pair.
christinemareebell
Yes, indeed. A pigeon pair, but I love that there’s BIG and little. Thank you, Corinne.
Leisl Leighton
So interesting to see the different covers and titles. It’s interesting when they change the colours or a character’s name to make it more accessible for language/race. Must be a strange thing as a writer to have a character name change – I spend so much time making sure my characters names work for me within the story. But whatever works I suppose. 🙂 Congrats on the big book – it looks wonderful.
christinemareebell
Hi Leisl
I’ve always loved the name Darcy, but I do have to say that I was pretty happy with the change to Luc (in Darcy Devlin and the Mystery Boy) for the French Canadian market. My French is very limited so the one thing I cannot be sure of is if the rhythm of my original sentences still work as well, since Luc is a single syllable and Darcy two. A similar change would be a real problem in my novels where the voice and language has been worked on and edited to “sing”. Throwing an extra syllable in would really ruin the rhythm of the prose at such times.
Chris