It's that time of year again. In London, leaves are falling, light is thinning and knitwear is once again taking a turn for the Scandinavian. Scandinavian, too, has been the flavour of our crime fiction since the end of August, when the latest in the Millennium series, The Girl in the Spider's Web by David Lagercrantz, was published simultaneously in 26 countries. As I write, 2.3 million copies of the book have been sold in all editions; UK print sales stand at well over 100,000 copies. For a novel two removes from the original (being both a spin-off and a translation) this is pretty good going.
In Frankfurt, editors, agents and rights managers talked solidly for eight-hour stretches, pitching and probing their way towards the Next Big Thing, the book that will take the world by storm in 2016. With my English PENSupported by eminent writers, this is the English branch of International Pen, which has centres in nearly 100 countries. It fights for freedom of expression and against political censorship. It campaigns for writers harassed, imprisoned and sometimes murdered for their views. http://www.englishpen.org/ Writers in Translation hat on, I would love for this Thing to be a book from another language: the more different voices we can welcome into English the better, in the interests of artistic diversity, freedom of expression and global understanding - but also in the spirit of finding and sharing the best stories, wherever they are.
