"Asian fantasy doesn't sell"

[telophase]

See here for a better discussion - short version is that when Cindy Pon was marketing her book, Silver Phoenix: Beyond the Kingdom of Xia,* one publisher told her that Asian fantasy didn't sell.

Not like those manga readers read Asian fantasy or anything.






* Out at the very end of April. I read the description and slapped a pre-order on that sucker so fast...

Comments

[cynthia1960.livejournal.com]

Oh, yeah. I saw that and preordered it as well.

[chibicharibdys.livejournal.com]

That book sounds awesome.

But that cover is awful. Really, HarperTeen? Did the cover really need more bloom, Photoshop embossing, and a drop shadow?

[estara.livejournal.com]

Thanks for that link. I was able to put it on my Wishlist at Amazon.de

[troubleinchina.livejournal.com]

*hee!* I just pre-ordered it at my local bookstore, who also ordered two other copies when I came in. :)

[redsnowpenguin.livejournal.com]

"Amy Tan meets Crouching Tiger" really doesn't appeal ;_; And the Amazon page for it didn't help its case, for me.

And then I translated the back cover blurb on Amazon into Chinese in my head, and went, "hm...not bad :O"

On Amy Tan and Crouching Tiger: these are really not designed with the Asian audience in mind, I think.

[aquatic-party.livejournal.com]

_{I don't know Amy Tan or Crouching Tiger *SHOT* but I was never a movie person...}



But I actually like Asian fantasy novels, and it's a shame there aren't more of them. The blurb on the back definitely caught my eye. Wishlisted; it'll probably be a summer read when I have monies to spend :D

[telophase.livejournal.com]

Amy Tan ... I like her earlier novels, but they do tend to be a little more over on the standard contemporary-fiction side than I like, being about things like relationships between mothers and daughters (The Joy Luck Club), although from the viewpoint of Chinese-American immigrants and their children.

ETA: Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon is what you get when you take a typical wuxia movie, with its tropes, and turn it into a higher art form - take the B-movie tropes and make an A movie with them. :D If you aren't familiar with wuxia movies, you might end up going "Huh?" But hey! Chow Yun Fat!

[fuchsoid.livejournal.com]

But surely both Amy Tan and Crouching Tiger are/were hugely successful and made piles of money for their publishers/producers. You would think that a combination of the two would be catnip to any publisher.

Anyway, it sounds exactly what I'd like, so I've pre-ordered it too.

[telophase.livejournal.com]

I know! I think over in the original thread, someone said it sounded like the perfect elevator pitch. :)

[lady-ganesh.livejournal.com]

Yeah, it's on my Amazon wishlist.

[ginny-t.livejournal.com]

oooooooh, shiny! *want*