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Foreign tastes: the changing book title…

Friday, November 25th, 2011

A chance discovery on Amazon.com (thanks to Christina) led me to searching out the foreign language editions of Jamie Ford’s Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet. It’s an elaborate title (and a beautiful book, don’t miss it!) but it rolls off the tongue and conveys a sense of the story. We’ve stuck with the title as it came out in the US before it was published here, and the French publishers’ translation is the quite faithful Hôtel des souvenirs doux-amers. Following a different tack, a number of other publishers including the German language ones opted to give Henry Lee’s childhood sweetheart prime position by naming their edition Keiko. I do wonder though what was behind the move to Il gusto proibito dello zenzero (The Forbidden Taste of Ginger) at the Italian publishers Garzanti.

Perhaps there’s a formula to these things, I’ll be paying more attention to this blog post perhaps – How to name your first novel.

Lesley-Anne Crooks, Sales & Digital Manager

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