U2-A Diary

This is too cool: There’s a Japanese translation of U2 – Diary available on Amazon.co.jp.

Here’s the link.

I could be wrong, but it looks like the translated version is already available and ready to be shipped. The folks at Omnibus said in an email that the licensing agreement was only signed recently, and that it’s probably not ready for shipping yet. No matter, I just think it’s super-cool to see the book being translated into Japanese.

I’m also aware of one other translation in the works, and will post on that as soon as possible.

Wondering if the book will be translated into your native language? Please read this blog post from last summer where I try to explain how all that works.

You may recall this post from the start of the month — Perfect Gift for U2 Fans — where I showed a photo of five (5) copies of U2 – a Diary on the shelf at my local Barnes & Noble bookstore.

A fear came over me right around Christmas … a fear that no one in my hometown had bought a copy of the book! I was thinking to myself, What if I go into B&N after Christmas and all five copies are still there?

The horror! The shame! The embarrassment!

Well, talk about relief: I walked into the store yesterday and, holding my breath the whole time, ventured into the music books section. Great news: There were only three copies left!

Whew! You have no idea what a relief that was. :)

It’s very cool and very strange to walk through my local bookstore and see my name on the side of a book. Crazy!

This is a photo from the Barnes & Noble store in Kennewick, where there are five copies ready to be bought! It’s the perfect gift for U2 fans, don’t you think? :-)

I actually had to ask the store to order these five. I live in more of a country music area, and they didn’t plan to stock the book at all. I explained that I’m the author and that I’d like to be able to send friends and family into the store to buy a copy as a gift for other U2 fans. They very kindly ordered five books right on the spot as I stood there watching.

Now hopefully these five won’t be on the shelf for too long!

This is what it looks like when you can’t believe there’s a book that’s been published with your name on it. :)

This one arrived today from Amazon. I’m expecting a few books to arrive from the warehouse any day now, and those will be used to send out to Beth, our prior contest winner, and for another 1-2 contests I still want to do.

I know a lot of people in the U.S. are getting their copies this week. What about in other countries? I’m kinda curious how far the distribution has spread….

Not long after posting yesterday’s update about Amazon saying they wouldn’t ship U2 – A Diary for another month, I got an email from Beth B., who’s helping to promote the book, letting me know that the book had arrived at the warehouse in New York. That confirmed my suspicion that Amazon wasn’t really going to have to wait a month to ship.

Then I went and traded emails all day today with the very helpful people at Omnibus and learned all kinds of stuff about how book distribution works, and was just about to post an explanation here on the blog, when fellow @U2 staffer Tassoula forwarded me an email from Amazon that showed this:

The Amazon.com sales page still says “Ships in 2-3 weeks,” but I’m guessing that’ll change in the next day or two. The Barnes & Noble page is already updated to show “Usually ships within 2-3 days.”

So, good news all around. If you pre-ordered, you should be getting the book soon. If you haven’t ordered yet, you should be able to get it pretty quickly.