For the first time ever, The Ice Star is available in another language. Thanks to Ana Catarina, Konstabel Fenna Brongaard has been translated to Portuguese! A Estrela do Gelo is live!
I’m excited about this. Not just because The Ice Star has been translated, but because this is another one of those moments when it’s possible to really feel the benefits of being an indie writer. The world of traditional publishing has had writers in a stranglehold for so long, paying peanuts while the people at the top of the company rake in the bucks.
New writers seeking to be published via the traditional route can expect horrendous contracts signing away the rights to their book and the individual characters, for the life of copyright, and, as has been seen “in all formats including those yet to be invented”. It’s all about Intellectual Property, and the potential for publishing houses to sell not just a book, but a million ways to create more IP from obscure characters mentioned in book 2 for a paragraph or two in a popular series.
I believe it’s possible to agree to sensible contracts with film studios and the like, without signing away the rights for everything. If that ever happens, you’ll be the first to know!
But, rant over, back to the point of this post… Translation, as I’ve mentioned before, used to be something you could just forget about unless you were traditionally published.
Not any more!
Thanks to amazing translators such as Françoise Chardonnier and Ana Catarina Palma Neves, I feel empowered to keep going, keep publishing, and to explore new markets!
And, as Buzz Lightyear is sitting on the windowsill by my desk, it feels right to say “To infinity and beyond!” 😉
Chris
