U2-A Diary

U2 fan Vagner G. emailed a couple days ago to ask if U2, A Diary would be translated into Portuguese and available in Brazil. Great question!

I have no idea how all that stuff works, so I emailed Chris at Omnibus to find out about international versions of the book. Here’s a rundown on what Chris explained to me:

• Foreign language publishers will be able to purchase rights to translate and publish the book.
• The cost of translation can sometimes be expensive, depending on how long the book is. As I mentioned a couple posts ago, U2, A Diary is looooong. (about 336 pages, give or take)
• Most international publishers wait until after the English language book is published, so they can see it for themselves. There are large book industry fairs/shows later this year where publishers from other countries will be able to see the book.
• Omnibus is always interested in having the book translated and published in other languages, but the final decision is up to those publishers.

So there you go. I’m getting quite an education in how publishing works. As always, anyone with questions can feel free to leave a comment or use the CONTACT link up top to get in touch.

Ahhh, the power of the people. Thanks in large part to your feedback about the original cover, we’ll have a slightly different cover for U2, A Diary. You said all four band members should be on the cover; I agreed and showed your comments to Chris, my editor; Chris agreed and took it from there.

Now we have all four band members on the front, in all their live concert awesomeness. Here’s what it’ll look like:

THANK YOU all for your feedback. I’m glad I wasn’t the only one who felt all four should be on there, and you made it easier for me to make the case with Omnibus. And thanks to Chris and Omnibus for agreeing and going along with the idea.

I’ve just finished going through proofs of the entire book, and sent back my findings to Chris and Sarah at Omnibus. What did I find? A fair amount of typos, a handful of misplaced photos that will need to be moved, and one or two mental screw-ups on my part that will be fixed (like, getting the name of a city wrong).

I also found what I think is a really good book. Yeah, I know I’m biased. :) But, while part of me quietly fears the negative reviews that I’m sure some fans/critics will write, I really do think most of the target audience is going to like this book. Omnibus did a good job locating appropriate photos, including plenty that I’d never seen before. (I also made several recommendations to change/add photos in certain spots.) The photos and text complement each other nicely. And, as you probably saw in the sneak peek post last week, the book looks nice. I like the layout, font choices, color usage, and so forth.

In other words, I’m a happy camper (for whatever that’s worth).

Here are a couple other updates I can share:

Release Date: Chris (my editor) tells me we’re targeting mid-October for the release date. October 10 is the specific date, but he says that may get pushed back a bit depending on how quickly the books get printed, shipped, etc.

Pages/Book Length: I think Amazon shows the book coming in at 320 pages. Based on the proofs I’ve seen, the last page of material is my source bibliography, and that’s on page 336. To quote a famous singer … “It’s a heavy mother.” The page count may change a bit as they make edits and photo changes before printing, but probably not a lot of change from the 336 number.

Cover: The cover that shows on Amazon and Amazon UK is not the final cover. Thanks in large part to your outcry about only having Bono and Edge on the cover, the cover now shows all four band members. It’s the same color scheme and style, but with Adam and Larry added into the mix. I’ll try to post it in the next day or three.

If anyone has any questions I might be able to answer, fire away in the comments and I’ll see what I can do. Thanks again for following along here on the blog, and for all your help when asked. You guys rock.

I’ve spent the past three days re-reading U2: A Diary (and I’m nowhere near finished). But instead of reading a MS Word doc, I’m actually reading proofs of what the book will look like when it’s published later this year. Sweet!

I can’t keep this to myself, so here are a few sample pages (click to see a larger version of each one):

The above is the beginning of the 1981 chapter. This is (currently) pages 38 and 39 in the book. You’ll see some gibberish text below the color photo — that’s where a photo caption will go.

And this sample is the next two pages from the 1981 chapter – pages 40 and 41.

The reason I’m going through all the proofs is to try to catch any remaining typos, make sure photos are generally placed in the right places, write some photo captions, and stuff like that. Need to wrap this up soon so the book can get sent to the printer! Back to work I go…..