I’ve had a few lovely mini-breaks already this summer in Norfolk, Suffolk and the Lake District, but now it’s time to get my head down, sadly, as I pretty much failed in my plan to have the summer off with my boys. It seemed that at some point in the last year I started saying yes to all the projects I was offered, instead of … Continue reading Books I’m working on – for publication in 2019
Leningrad, 1938. When Shura and Tanya’s parents and little brother suddenly disappear in the middle of the night, it’s rumoured that they have been taken by the mysterious Black Raven – and that their parents were spies. Tanya and Shura are determined to find their family – and so Shura decides to hand himself in to the Raven. He is taken to the Grey … Continue reading THE RAVEN’S CHILDREN by Yulia Yakovleva
Title: Apple Cake and Baklava Author: Kathrin Rohmann Illustrator: Franziska Harvey My English translation published by: Darf Publishers 2018 Original title (German): Apfelkuchen und Baklava (Bastei Luebbe) Aimed at readers aged 8-12 Reviews “Ahead of World Refugee Day, a book for middle schoolers, Apple Cake and Baklava, by Kathrin Rohmann, translated from the German by Ruth Ahmedzai Kemp, is just out. It’s a lovely story … Continue reading Apple Cake and Baklava
The internationally bestselling author of The Hidden Life of Trees shows how we can decipher nature’s secret signs by studying the weather.In this first-ever English translation of The Weather Detective, Peter Wohlleben uses his long experience and deep love of nature to help decipher the weather and our local environments in a completely new and compelling way. Analyzing the explanations for everyday questions … Continue reading The Weather Detective: Rediscovering Nature’s Secret Signs
This year has been an extremely busy one with some very enjoyable and satisfying books to translate. I’ve fulfilled a personal ambition: I was hoping to translate one novel from each of my three languages by the time I was 40, which I’ve managed with a couple of years to spare! It’s also been a longstanding ambition to get into children’s books, and I’ve started … Continue reading What I translated in 2017… and what’s out in 2018
This urgent and timely collection brings together seven specially commissioned stories from the so-called ‘banned nations’: Iran, Iraq, Libya, Syria, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen. Written in response to Trump’s 2017 travel ban, it showcases new works by previously unplatformed writers, exploring the emotional and personal impact of all restrictions on movement – both existing restrictions and potential future bans. Covering a range of approaches – … Continue reading Banthology: Stories from Unwanted Nations
The Words without Borders July 2017 issue “Divided Countries” includes an excerpt I’ve translated of A Crime in Ramallah by Palestinian author Abbad Yahya. In this excerpt, Noor – one of three narrators in the novel – remembers his adolescence in Palestine, marked by the second intifada. You can also listen to the extract on SoundCloud and read the original text in Arabic on the Words without Borders website. The … Continue reading A Crime in Ramallah, Abbad Yahya
