Well, it’s official, I guess — I’m now an “internationally published author.”
Just yesterday, my friendly neighborhood mail delivery person dropped off a beaten-all-to-hell box on my doorstep. This box looked like it had been through a war. Either that, or it had traveled from the other side of the planet.
Guess which it was?
Since it wasn’t the special Baghdad version of Fanboy, there’s only one other possibility: It was my comp copies of my Australian edition! Whoo-hoo!
I can only assume that this means that the book will be on store shelves in Australia very soon. I expect an influx of Australian IP addresses to this site any minute now. Don’t disappoint me, Australia.
Other than the fact that it’s in paperback and slightly smaller than the American edition, there’s not much that immediately tips you off that this is a foreign edition. Then you start to notice little things — like the single quotation marks on the cover blurbs. The new publisher name/logo. Even the spine is slightly different. (It has my full name, not just my last name.)
Inside, there are almost no differences, as I’m told the book was reproduced directly from the American files. A typo I found in the American hardcover has been corrected. (Huzzah!) The indicia page has been replaced entirely with a new Australian indicia page. (Which means that the dedication originally on the American edition is now gone, alas.) And there are some ads in the back for some other Pan MacMillan titles, including a little something called The Book Thief.
Yeah, that’s right — Markus Zusak rides on my coattails. You heard it here first, people.
All in all, it’s a nice package, and it’s very cool to see my very first foreign edition! Thanks to Anna and the rest of the crew Down Under for making this happen.