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While Germany and the US are still dominant among children’s book export markets, emerging territories such as the United Arab Emirates and Latin America are showing potential this year, say publishers.
Orion rights director Alexandra Nicholas said the UAE’s Sharjah International Book Fair (pictured) had opened up a huge amount of business with the UK, particularly with books for younger readers. “They’re not going for YA because of the subject matter—there are certain cultural boundaries in place—but growth will come from books for the younger age groups, such as picture books and early readers,” she said.
Giuseppe Trapani, rights director at OUP, said the publisher was selling a lot of educational titles in the Middle East and Arab countries “which are emerging from their revolutions, so the Lebanon, UAE and Egypt are all doing well”.
For Nosy Crow, two significant markets are Brazil and China. Egmont’s Judith Tinsley also singled out Brazil as a market that “has always been big”, but she said it was showing signs of “coming through again”. Tinsley said the country had a renewed vigour in its educational programmes, meaning more bookshops and libraries are opening. Chile and Uruguay are also doing well, she said.
Sarah Packenham, rights director at Andersen Press, pointed out that the Latin American market was keeping deals with Spain afloat. “We expected the market in Spain to drop more but publishers are holding on, perhaps because of their links to South America. Spanish publishers like to have world Spanish rights,” she said. At the other end of the scale, the markets in Greece and Portugal are suffering because of the countries’ economic problems, said Trapani.
Jane Willis, foreign rights agent at United Agents, singled out the Netherlands as being particularly problematic at the moment. “Holland is a dire market, it really has declined,” she said. “Lots of booksellers and publishing houses are closing, and there is more publishing of original Dutch works than there used to be.”
In terms of titles, the biggest sales are often well-established brands or series. “China always wants award winners, so there was huge interest from China in Marcus Sedgwick after he won the Printz Award,” said Nicholas. For Hot Key Books, Sally Gardner’s Maggot Moon sold in more than 20 countries, and for Andersen, the Elmer brand—which is celebrating its 25th anniversary this year—is a huge seller.
Kate Wilson, m.d. of Nosy Crow said her company sells more illustrated books than fiction. “There is a financial imperative to illustrated books internationally because of the cost to make them,” she said, adding that pop-up books are often big sellers. Nosy Crow has, for example, sold 97,000 copies of Axel Scheffler’s Flip Flap Farm worldwide.
In terms of fiction, series titles often sell well. Nosy Crow sold The Rescue Princesses series by Paula Harrison for a six-figure sum in the US, she said.