Now here we are a year older and, hopefully, wiser. Like I've already announced, the Romanian edition, "Instincte umane", was picked up by Millennium Books to be published, with a launch at Bookfest book fair at the end of May.
So now I'm going to tell you how this particular project came to life. Shortly after my Romanian short story collection "Efectul de nautil" was released, I got a phone call from Horia Ursu from Millennium Books. He began by saying something like "How about making another book?"
At first, I was stunned. I had no idea what he was talking about. I was working on something, but I had nothing ready to be published. I answered with a tentative "Okaaay... What book?"
"Human Instincts!"
Ah. OK, now it made sense. Kind of. Unfortunately, it led to one of the most moronic conversation I have ever had, with my answers consisting mostly in "Yes... okay... sure... of course... if you want to..." It ended with me promising to send him the final Romanian draft correlated with the English version. When I put the phone down and replayed the conversation in my head, I was convinced he was going to call again in the morning and tell me he changed his mind. I mean as a writer people expect you to be more articulate, and I had been nothing of that sort.
Lucky for me, Horia is wiser than that, and the next contact we had was him sending me the cover art for approval. This time I had no objections. I liked it from the start, even if it's so different from the one I used for the English edition. And there it was, we had another book.
It just proves that no matter what you do, you have to write the stories for yourself. Someday, someone is going to like them. It took three years to see this baby going to print, but it's been three happy years with little disappointment on the way. I wish you all the same thing!
The actual book looks like in the photos below (Photos (c) Horia Nicola Ursu), and it can be ordered here or purchased at Bookfest in Bucharest, between May 29 and June 2nd.
No comments:
Post a Comment