Tuesday 9 September 2014

The Italian Job

I am in the process of signing a deal to publish my back catalogue of Falconer stories (and maybe the short Zuliani series) in Italy.  The publisher is Mondadori, who have a series of detective novels under the name of 'Il Giallo'.  This has a curious symmetry as the word means 'yellow' in Italian and derives from the background colour of the early editions.


My first publisher was Victor Gollancz, and though my books were too late for the treatment, early Gollancz crime and SF books were, of course, always published in a yellow cover.


I always recall as a young teenager (though the name was not used in my day) that I scoured the public library shelves for yellow spines as my primary means of book selection.  I was later very proud to become a Victor Gollancz author, though rather disappointed my crime stories would not be 'wrapped' in yellow!  There was some talk, I suppose in the late 90s, of reviving the yellow cover.  I think some Gollancz books did come out with a yellow spine.  But none of my titles.
Now, at last, I will be published in yellow.  I will keep you up date concerning the progress of my Italian editions.  If you want to read them in Italian, that is.