Rachelle Delaney

Remember back in the day when I raised the Bulgarian flag to celebrate selling Bulgarian rights to The Ship of Lost Souls? Good lord, that seems like a long time ago. To be perfectly honest, I’d actually forgotten about the Bulgarian translation until today.

It appears that The Ship of Lost Souls, or rather, КОРАБЪТ НА ИЗГУБЕНИТЕ ДУШИ, is out in Bulgaria! Hooray! Here’s hoping that Bulgarian middle-graders like pirate children as much as I do. (And I apologize if what I pasted there doesn’t actually say “The Ship of Lost Souls.” I am blindly copying and pasting.)

And check out the cover! I think UNISCORP (my Bulgarian publisher — doesn’t that just sound fabulous?) did a wonderful job.

I like to think that I’m good at keeping secrets. I’m not sure if my friends would agree with this (my sister definitely wouldn’t), but I’m just going to keeping telling myself I am.

But this secret was a real test of my will. I’ve known for a while now that there was a big, exciting book deal on my horizon, but I didn’t want to shout it from rooftops until the ink was finally dry. (Okay, I might have whispered it to a few ears. Maybe more than a few. Whatever. I tried.)

So the ink is dry, and I can finally tell you about it! Here goes: Grosset & Dunlap, an imprint of Penguin US, has bought the rights to The Ship of Lost Souls, The Lost Souls of Island X, and TWO other books in the Lost Souls series. YES. Books 1 and 2 will be available in the States in 2012 (with gorgeous new covers! Eee!). And I’m already hard at work on Book 3, due out in 2013.

Obviously, I’m thrilled to bits. And nervous. And hoping I can deliver. But mostly just excited to share the adventures with American audiences.

And have I mentioned that I heart my agent? None of this would have ever happened without her.

Life has been busy of late. There have been all kinds of changes, including a lovely new apartment whose soaring ceilings make up for the lack of air flow. It is freaking hot in here. But no matter. I’m all settled in with my towering bookshelf and low-maintenance plants, and yes, Lyle the five-foot tall, one-eared giraffe, who stands at attention near the window. To be honest, I was planning on leaving him behind, but when I returned to my old place to clean up, he was sitting in a big box, head poking out, and giving me this “you’ve got to be kidding me” look. I apologized profusely, slung him over my shoulder, and took him to his new home.

Some day, I will tell you all about Lyle’s vast and growing collection of seasonal neckties. But not today. Today I want to share some good news — news that got buried in all the chaos of moving. The Canadian Children’s Book Centre chose The Lost Souls of Island Xas one of it’s Best Books for Kinds and Teens of 2010. Yes! Huzzah! There were fist pumps and happy dances galore.

If you can, you should pick up the CCBC’s Best Books publication. It’s packed with great suggestions for quality reads.

I’m excited to see that The Ship of Lost Souls is up for another award – this time the Red Cedar Awards. This means that over the next year, loads of young BC readers will be reading the novel, as well as those of my esteemed fellow nominees, and voting for their favourites. Yay for readers’ choice awards!

Congrats to all nominated. And to the young judges, happy reading!