Foreign editions - books for free!

Great post this morning.
No, I don’t mean that as a comment on what I’m posting here – but the postal delivery that arrived at my door just a short time ago.

When the postman rings the doorbell that means – usually – one of three things

1. A delivery of a parcel of books that either I or the BM have ordered from Amazon or some other on-line book source. These do arrive with great regularity as we both have bad book habits

2. Work of some sort involving books – proofs for one of mine or one of his.

3. Delivery of a parcel of books written by one or other of us – these are either author copies, or , sometimes, foreign editions of the books

This morning’s parcels were both - some paperback editions of my next UK release. That’s The Italian’s Forced Wife and officially it’s out on April 7th, though I know from experience that it will very probably start appearing on the shelves next week.

Then I got a bundle of foreign editions. These tend to arrive in batches - a bit like buses. You don’t get any for a while and then several appear all at once. The books I got today were two Japanese translations and one Spanish. I always like seeing foreign editions – apart from the obvious fact that this means the books have been brought out in more countries and so, hopefully, more sales will bring in more income, I’m always fascinated by the way that the books are produced and packaged in the international out lets. They’re never exactly the same – even the English speaking markets like UK, Australia and America, have very different cover designs. – You can see those on my web site.

But today each one of these translations had that little bit extra which made them even more interesting



The Spanish Amor en Venecia is a reprint of a book first published in 2000 - Her Secret Bridegroom – this time it has come out as part of a special mini-series called ‘Amor en . . .’ and as there are only going to be 6 of these published, I’m honoured to be one of the ones chose. Each book is accompanied by a tourist guide to the city where it is set – so, obviously, my book has a guide to Venice. Checking the Spanish Harlequin site, I see that the cities that will be covered in this way are : Paris, Venice, Lisbon, New York, Athens, and Istanbul.


Japanese book 1 is a translation of the second book in my Alcolar Family trilogy – The Spaniard’s Inconvenient Wife. But this book also has a little extra – it includes a print version of Wife For Real which was a short story I wrote for the eHarlequin web site and which wasthe story that began the whole Alcolar Family series. I’m really happy to see that this story is included as when the trilogy came out in America I had hundreds of enquiries from readers who wanted to know where they could find a copy of Wife For Real to read. If you’re one of those who is still looking for it – then the M&B Site has it here.



Finally, Japanese book 2 is another reprint – this time of an even older book – one that originally came out in 1990. This is The Golden Thief and it’s reprinted in the Japanese Classics series. It’s great to see older titles coming back again - and, hopefully, earning again!

But the other thing about these foreign editions is that I always get at least two copies of each - sometimes more. And although I like to keep one copy to add to my collection of all the editions of my books, these do mount up. Only yesterday I was thinking I would have to do something about the collection that is amassing – and now I have 3 more to add to it. Every now and then I try to have a clear out – some have gone to libraries with language collections, some to college where the languages – such as Spanish or Italian – even Japanese - are taught. But still more keep coming.
So here’s a blog-opportunity for someone.

If you are reading this blog and you live in one of the countries that I have translations from - any of the countries listed below – then email me and give me a. the language you want a book in and b. your postal address and I will send you a copy of one of the foreign edition books for free.

The languages I have available right now are;
Italian - 6 books
Spanish - 3 books
Japanese – 2 books
German – 1 book
Afrikaans – 1 book
Greek – I book


This will be strictly on a one book per person and first come, first served basis.

And if you know of any deserving cause – an International women’s group – or a library that wants particular languages, or if you teach languages somewhere and think some of my translations might help - let me know . I’m always glad to find good homes for my books!

And maybe this will let me see if this blog is being read by anyone in any of those countries.