Wonderful sales news continue to pour in: this year’s Runeberg Junior Prize winner, Night Express written by Karin Erlandsson and illustrated by Peter Bergting was sold to Straarup & Co. in Denmark, while ABC Forlag acquired the Danish rights for Eva Frantz’s new ghost and spook novel for the middle grade readers, Queen of the Night!
Night Express has been as popular at home as abroad: close to 13,000 copies have been sold in Finland, and foreign rights have now been sold to 4 territories. Erlandsson’s novels for the middle grade (aged 7–13) readers have definitely been seeing a surge of interest lately: just a couple of weeks ago, HLA announced a five-book deal for the author in Poland, and at the end of last year the first two books in the magical Song of the Eye Gemstone series were sold to Dedalus in the UK. Erlandsson has been nominated twice for the Nordic Council Literature Prize (in 2018 and 2020), and was also a nominee for the Children’s novel prize in Sweden. Here you can find a beautiful video of the author presenting the series and read an interesting short interview about Erlandsson’s inspirations.
Eva Frantz’s exciting spooky novels for the middle-graders are too, rapidly finding a home abroad. Not long ago, the acclaimed British publisher Pushkin Press, with its awarded and widely admired children’s list, acquired World English rights for Frantz’s Runeberg Junior winner Raspberry Hill (2018) and optioned Queen of the Night as well. In an interview given to HLA, Frantz discussed the overwhelming reaction of the small readers to her debut in the horror-for-children genre – which has clearly grown into a demand for more! Don’t forget to tune in Literature from Finland podcast this month, as we will be interviewing Frantz about ATMOSPHERES.
Congratulations to both authors, and fingers crossed for more foreign rights deals soon!