Skip to main content

Special thing

A little while ago, one of my readers wrote to tell me that she really wanted her mom to read When You Reach Me so that they could talk about it. Was it by any chance published in Korean, she wondered?

Yes! Maybe. I knew that a Korean translation was underway somewhere because I had written an introduction for it. But I had no details - I had never seen a copy of the translated book, and I wasn't sure it had ever actually been published. I looked up the name of the publisher, CharlieBook, and sent it to her.

Today she wrote to tell me that she and her mom have found the book. She attached a copy of the cover in case I was curious about it (I was! I can't enlarge it enough to see all of the details, but I like what I see. . .).

I love the thought of this fabulous girl and her mom sharing the book across two languages.

Comments

Anonymous said…
It must have been absolutely wonderful to receive that letter! A mom and her daughter, sharing your book between two different languages! That's really nice to ponder.
P.S. I was just looking through your archives after reading your latest blog post, and when I came back...Voila!! There was some more to read! [I love it. :)]
February 24, 2011 at 9:57 PM
Steven Cain said…
How cool is that!?

I like the cover art.

I think I would have to collect a copy in each language. How many did they translate it in to?
February 25, 2011 at 6:37 AM
Beth S. said…
What a great story. I wish parents read with their older children more often. Not reading aloud together, just reading the same book at the same time so they can talk about it. I always recommend that to the parents of my students at conferences, but I don't think many of them actually do it.
February 25, 2011 at 10:06 AM
Rebecca Stead said…
Beth, one of the many perks of my job is that I've read a good number of the books my kids are reading, and it's pretty great. I do get the sense that more parents are getting into it (not that I have any statistics to back me up).

Steven, I think the book has been sold in 23 overseas markets, though a couple of them (UK, Australia) required no translation. I would love to have them all, but it may take me some time to collect them.

And thanks, Anonymous!
February 25, 2011 at 10:01 PM
Anonymous said…
That's so cool. I often read the books my son is reading, partly to stay informed about what he'd doing, but more so that we can "talk books" later. I never thought about how much more challenging that would be in bi-lingual families.
March 16, 2011 at 1:18 PM
Anonymous said…
Thats very cool! I love your book When You Reach Me! In fact its my favorite book! I met you once at my school, you really inspired me! I also loved reading a Wrinkle in Time!
May 29, 2011 at 7:07 PM
Post a Comment