This week is a very busy one for me – I’m out at a tour of schools, speaking about Jolly Foul Play. But I’ve got a very exciting bit of news about Daisy and Hazel that I really wanted to share with you: the first foreign-language editions of Murder Most Unladylike and Arsenic for Tea have been printed!
They’re the Italian editions, from the publisher Mondadori, and they are a book lover’s dream. They’re hardbacks, with the most beautiful endpapers – I’m completely in love with the way Mondadori has reworked the British covers to fit with the new Italian titles. I’m also delighted by those titles. My Italian is quite wonky, but I think the rough translations are ‘Murder for Girls’ and ‘On Holiday with Death’ – and the series title, of course, is ‘Miss Detective’!
I can tell that the translators, Manuela Salvi and Manuela Piemonte, have really captured the essence of the books – there are loads of lovely touches, my favourite of which has to be Beanie’s new name. In Italian she’s ‘Scricciolo’, which means Wren – something small and sweet, just like Beanie!
Last week was Bologna Book Fair, the biggest children’s book rights fair of the year. My (tireless and brilliant) agent was there – and she got to see the enormous Miss Detective banner that Mondadori had put up to advertise the books. Hazel and Daisy have arrived in Italy in style!
