But just thought I’m chime in, a year later, and say that my first assumption on seeing that cover was that it was Naha. Which, I know, he wasn’t ever described with white hair in the novel, but the darkness of the hood, the beauty of the figure, and the fact that he changes his appearance constantly… ::shrug:: Was the first thing I thought when I saw that picture.

I’ve spoken with my editor there already (via my agent, via the foreign rights agent), as I mentioned in the OP. Have been as diplomatic as I could about it, and also attempted to suggest that the protagonist for book 2 — who is black — should probably not be rendered white in a similar way. The results are as I’ve reported. But I think it’s safe to say the fact that this got released publicly without me ever seeing it is an indicator of how much my input is desired.

Thanks for the info about why German editions tend to be chopped up, etc.; I didn’t know that! Did know about the stock art problem, though — this is what I was attempting to explain in the OP about art that’s “symbolic”.

Echoing what edifanob above said, German publishers frequently change the title in translation to something they think will sell better. In this case, I suspect that a literal translation “Die Hunderttausend Königreiche”, i.e. two very long words, was considered too awkward for a book cover or to type into Amazon, etc…

The reasoning behind the splitting of books into two or sometimes even three parts is that German requires more words than English, hence German texts are longer than the English equivalent. And with a 100000+ words fantasy novel, that can add up and make for unwieldy books (Wheel of Time is literally twice as long in German). The solution is usually either more or less random cuts (of which sometimes neither author nor translator are aware) or splitting. Splitting, though annoying, is preferable IMO.

Regarding the cover, German covers tend to be less literal and more genre-coded than US and UK covers. They also often use stock art. Hence you get spaceships for SF, whether there is one in the story or not (John Scalzi is apparently permanently frustrated by this), women with flowy hair for urban fantasy, terrible bodiceripper covers for historical romance, etc… From cursory experience, I’d suspect that your cover is supposed to indicate that this is an epic fantasy (hooded figures are popular for epic fantasy) with a female protagonist. Regarding the whitewashing, I suspect that the cover designer has no idea that the protagonist is not white (it’s probably stock art anyway) and that the publisher probably honestly has no idea that a whitewashed cover is deemed offensive in the US. Actual POCs are still pretty rare in Germany and POCs usually only appear on the covers of books about the exotic other, e.g. those dreadful “White woman goes to Africa as a tourist and marries Maasai warrior” memoirs that were all the range some years ago, and on books about racism. And yes, I think it sucks.

I don’t know how far the production process for the German edition has progressed, but what you might try is contact Blanvalet via your agent and calmly explain why the whitewashed cover is problematic, because I suspect they honestly are unaware how offensive this is. I know that John Scalzi had issues with the title of one of his German editions, because it was too close to the US title of a Heinlein novel, and managed to get it changed, so German publishers are not beyond listening. And I am pretty certain they don’t want to be considered racist. You’ll probably still not get a POC on the cover, but maybe a generic castle or at least a woman who isn’t quite as white as that cover model.

On the plus side, Blanvalet usually has pretty good production values regarding paper and cover stock quality. Their translations usually are decent as well, at least based on what I’ve seen in books bought for friends.

Would you do me a favor, or ask another German fan who speaks English to do the same? When the book comes out there — because I’m not sure I’ll receive a copy — could you take a look at it and tell me the quality of the translation? Feel free to get it from the library or just browse it in the store, since you’ll have already gotten a copy. I’m curious. In exchange I will make sure you get an ARC of book 2, when they come out. =)

Blanvalet bought the rights to all three books, so to my knowledge they won’t be split into further threes. (That would make it a what, nonology?) I don’t know what the titles will be, though — as you’ve seen in this case, the first time I learned of the title change was when this edition popped up on Goodreads.

And I’m angry about the cover. Where is the connection to the story? It is the 199th book cover showing a hooded person. Bravo!!! Well done by the publisher.
I’m deeply grateful that I’m independent from translated editions.

Given the title and the cover I imploringly hope you got a good translator.

Now I look forward to the delivery of my copy of The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms within next week.

http://linkspam.dreamwidth.org/20938.html

It’s a gorgeous cover. I really wish it were remotely representative.

Good luck sorting this out!