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September 2015
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August 2015
August news
If you missed out on our summer email newsletter, you can read it here below... Share If you cannot view this email,please Click Here to view an online version. Unsubscribe/Update Profile | Share With Friends | Subscribe Blacksmith Books, Hong Kong Newsletter August 2015 New biography: Shanghai's Baghdadi Jews Shanghai’s Baghdadi Jews: A Collection of Biographical ReflectionsA compilation of 26 [...]
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August 2015
And now a word from our intern…
This internship began with a long email to an unknown (to me) English publisher in Hong Kong (whom I found by googling “English publisher Hong Kong”), and a desperate hope that said unknown publisher would respond and give me some work experience in the summer. But as the days wore on, and the weeks, which then turned into two months, [...]
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May 2015
Paper Tigress is reprinted
We're pleased to announce that Paper Tigress, Rachel Cartland's memoir of her years in the Hong Kong government, sold out. And it's now reprinted and is back in the shops. To mark the occasion, we print below the text of a speech Rachel gave to a Hong Kong business group late last year. A Difficult Passage I was a Hong [...]
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July 2013
Hong Kong: Launchpad for the future of Asian publishing
Want some insights into the world of book publishing in Hong Kong and China? A bunch of local publishing folk, including yours truly, are quoted in an informative article in Publishing Trends. While globally powerful partnerships between Chinese publishers and international publishers may take a while to unfold, Hong Kong’s own industry still offers plenty of international exposure to authors [...]
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July 2013
The New Word Sellers
I was interviewed for this Hong Kong Trader article about Asian publishers in advance of the Hong Kong Book Fair. Many small publishers use print-on-demand technology to make books available in small quantities, but I'm not keen on it because sales are rarely very high, and such books are only sold through the giant online booksellers, not in bookshops on [...]
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April 2013
Putting together a Yunnan cookbook
We've just spent three days cooking, shooting and eating over 70 dishes from Yunnan province, the most diverse in China for both food and people. Linda has brought some hard-to-find ingredients from the province; we've been to various shops and markets in Wan Chai; and Linda has cooked up the dishes with Annabel in her Hong Kong kitchen. See a [...]
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January 2013
Download a free study guide for Bhutan memoir “Dragon Bones”
From Murray Gunn, author of Dragon Bones: Two Years Beneath the Skin of a Himalayan Kingdom: I tried very hard to allow the Bhutanese people in Dragon Bones to tell their own stories and to minimise the bias created by my beliefs, my mood and other aspects of my life. I knew it was an impossible task before I began [...]
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January 2013
“Kowloon: Unknown Territory” – photo exhibition at the FCC
The Foreign Correspondents' Club in Hong Kong is holding a wall exhibition of Ira Chaplain's photos from Kowloon: Unknown Territory. "In my 19 years spent in various parts of Hong Kong, I have never lived in Kowloon. Before I took this assignment, like so many in this city, my life existed largely on Hong Kong side. I never knew the [...]
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November 2012
Nov 26: Come to the Blacksmith/Bookazine Booksigning Extravaganza!
As we count down the final four weeks to Christmas, come and get your Hong Kong gift books signed at Bookazine. We’ve brought together 14 Blacksmith authors who have all written about Hong Kong. Come and meet them over a festive glass of wine, and get your books signed by: Jonathan Chamberlain, author of King Hui: The Man Who Owned [...]
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October 2012
Busy busy
Sorry for our recent silence on the blog -- we're working on getting 12 books out by the end of November, our busiest season ever. Half of these are reprints, and that's good news for publishers! Look out for updates on the new books in the next few weeks.
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April 2012
Singapore availability
Since the start of this year, our books have been available in Singapore (and Malaysia) through Select Books, a company which specialises in books from all parts of Asia. (It's my dream to one day open a similar bookshop in Hong Kong). The timing is good, as several of our recent and upcoming titles have Singapore connections. Select Books' store [...]
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April 2012
Recap: Meet the authors in Hong Kong
Blacksmith publisher Pete Spurrier was among four writers who shared their insights with Hong Kong members of the Asian American Journalists Association on the evening of April 3. Pete has written guidebooks to Hong Kong, while the other authors -- Cameron Dueck, Michelle Yu and Blossom Kan -- have written travelogues and novels, so there were different perspectives and a [...]
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November 2011
Cha: How to be a Hong Kong publisher
In the latest issue of Cha, the excellent Hong Kong-based online literary journal which publishes fiction, creative non-fiction, reviews and photography, I've shared some insights from what I've learned about publishing over the past seven years in business. People often express amazement that English-language publishers can survive in Hong Kong. I share their surprise. Hong Kong is a small place, [...]
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July 2011
Another Side to the Story: Publishing in Hong Kong
In the run-up to the 2011 Hong Kong Book Fair, which opens this week, Blacksmith Books is featured in a Hong Kong Trader story about publishing in Asia. Hong Kong has always been viewed by the publishing world as a place to print books rather than to have them published. That's changing due to shifting global focus on Asia. At [...]
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June 2011
How does Jonathan Chamberlain write?
Find out by reading this interview with the author of King Hui and the new Alphabet of Vietnam. What is your most recent book? Tell us a bit about it. My latest book is a novel called The Alphabet of Vietnam. Vietnam is a word that simultaneously conjures up a country and a war – and not just any war. [...]
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February 2011
Tracy Quan and Tiger Moms
Muhammad Cohen's Hong Kong On Air is now available in the US, and it's caught the attention of New Yorker Tracy Quan -- author of Diary of a Manhattan Call Girl -- who says: "In this irreverent comic novel, The World of Suzie Wong meets CNBC's Squawk Box, and sweatshop lingerie proves a harsh mistress. Hong Kong On Air is [...]
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November 2010
Mon Dieu!
We've sold Jonathan Chamberlain's Chinese Gods into French, for publication next year by Éditions GOPE. Like us, they publish books about Asia, and their forthcoming titles include a translation of The World of Suzie Wong. So if you'd like to learn about Lei Kung and Lu Pan in the language of love, look out for Les Dieus Chinoises in your [...]