Animation by Kayelle Allen at The Author's Secret

Wednesday, April 3, 2019

Guest Blogger Jenny Twist on Dual Language Publications


It's always a pleasure to welcome my friend Jenny Twist to my blog, and especially so when she has something exciting to share with us all.  So let me hand straight over to Jenny to tell you about her latest publishing venture.

Today I am launching a joint venture with Alicia Pérez Alarza.

It was clear to me when I was learning Spanish that there were very few really good dual language books available. Five years ago a friend of mine complained about the same thing,
I did some research and discovered he was right. Most dual language books available on Amazon are very poor quality, either translated by English speakers who are not bilingual, or are completely inappropriate for those wishing to learn modern Spanish. What is the point, for example, of using Don Quixote as background reading? If you were teaching English to a Spaniard, would you  recommend them to read Chaucer?

And there is another point. Something that infuriated and offended me when I was learning Spanish. The stories they choose are so boring. It upset me to spend good money on boring books.

So I published one of my own. I chose Mantequero because it was short, the title was the same in both languages, and I had already had some interest from a school in California where many of the students were Hispanic.  


I felt it was essential that the translation should be done by a native speaker. Good translations are invariably translated into the translator’s native tongue. However good you are at a foreign language you will never be able to speak it like a native. So I paid for a professional translation.
It worked very well. I know of at least two schools which adopted it but the cost of translation was prohibitive. It was too high to make the book viable commercially.

So I reluctantly abandoned my plan to produce a whole series.

Then something happened. An author friend of mine said he had many of his books translated into
foreign languages using a translation site where you split the royalty with the translator. Sadly, the site only does straight translations, not dual language, but in the course of having translations done (mostly in Portuguese) I came across Alicia and we became friends.

I told her about my dream of producing dual language books and she was very enthusiastic. Our first joint effort is out today as an eBook and will be followed shortly by the print book.

We think we can probably produce a new book every six weeks or so.  Once we have, say, half a dozen we can start seriously marketing them for schools.


If, in the meantime, any of you are learning Spanish, I’d be delighted if you read this and tell me what you think.


Here is the blurb for The Children of Hope:








Click on the book cover or the title to find Mantequero on Amazon
Click on the book cover or the title find The Children of Hope on Amazon

8 comments:

ManicScribbler said...

Thanks for being guest host, Jenny. I'm always happy to hear from you. I wish you the very best of luck with this exciting new adventure. Hope it works out really well for you. xxx

Jenny Twist said...

Thank you so much for giving me this opportunity, Lyn. It's always a pleasure to be a guest on your superb blog.
Love
Jenny

John Holt said...

A very interesting article. Wish you every success Jenny.

Jenny Twist said...

Thank you, John. I really appreciate your comment. I wouldn't have done this if it wasn't for you.
Love
Jenny
xx

Expo 2020 said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
Tara Fox Hall said...

Good luck with this, Jenny! I think its a great idea and will be very useful for schools, it sure would have helped me be more fluent in other languages if I'd had Manequero to read as one of my learning options! :)

Unknown said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
dealmecoupon said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.

Post a Comment