Manga Magic

The Easter weekend has meant that there has been no post arriving at the house for several days but with the end of the holidays, the post man has resumed his deliveries and yesterday there was a rush of new  editions of my books. 

There was a Norwegian edition of 12 Month Mistress,    a Spanish translation of The Return Of The Stranger,  two Japanese editions -  one of The Devil and Miss Jones, the second  one of my favourite things - a manga reworking of one of my much earlier titles - The Hostage Bride which was originally published in 2001.
The Manga editions are always intriguing - it's interesting to see key scenes from my past books  taken and reworked  in this specialised form.  This page here shows

a  moment where  my hero Ricardo Valeron - who has kidnapped  the heroine from her wedding -  first shows a gentler side. After watching the heroine, Fliss struggle to remove the innumerable pins that hold her wedding veil in place, he comes to her aid.

But I think my favourite image is the one where Rico 'casually tossed the bunch of keys up into the air, catching them one-handed as they fell  back down. '

In the Manga edition, Rico is twirling a set of keys  that look as if they would have  secured a dungeon rather than a bedroom door in a modern house!

But perhaps the most intresring difference is in the portrayal of the characters - the hero and heroine. With their huge eyes, pointed chins and high cheekbones, the image is very different  from the tall, dark and powerful hero on the Presents edition cover of  The Hostage Bride . 

This has always been one of my favourite covers.

It's always a thrill to see  much older books  -  it's  now 12 years since this was first published -  being revived and reprinted.  And it's a special thrill to  see them reproduced in this very differnt, specialised  and really rather magic format.