An international gallery of Princess Academy

For years I've been meaning to put together a page on my website showing the different foreign covers for my books. I have some, but my scanner is currently being devilish so I haven't been able to scan their covers. (I wish I got a copy of all of them!) With the help of Enna Isilee at Squeaky Books I've been able to track down images of quite a few. I'll put them on my site soon but thought I'd feature them on my blog from time to time as well. Since I've got princess academy on the brain (going through the first page proofs of palace of stone and feeling really happy and relieved!) here's Miri from around the world. I'll put the publishing language beneath each picture. If you want to play "name that language," scroll slowly and see if you can guess first without looking!

Spainish hardcover and paperback. Spain consistently does beautiful covers, in my opinion. Wait till you see Goose Girl and Enna Burning!

Romanian, keeping the US hardcover.

Chinese hardcover and paperback. I love that it's not just the US that tends to vary styles between the two formats.

Korean also kept the original painting. Korea is another country that consistenly wows me with their high quality publishing. Can't wait to show you their Book of a Thousand Days.

English - UK. Do you prefer the first or second?

Japanese. Did you guess?

Italian. The latter is the hardcover. I kind of suspect the cover artist hadn't read the book, but still one of my favorites just because it's so fun and different.

French! Isn't this lovely? I don't think this cover would sell well in the US market, but I'm charmed by it.

Dutch. I find I'm somewhat alarmed by the large red profile. And apparently in Dutch, Shannon is only allowed one middle "n."

Danish.

Hebrew. (Notice the image is flipped.)

Norwegian. I received a copy of this one in the mail and looked at it for some time, trying to figure out which book it was. I suppose that's Miri and Peder? In a blanket? And...yes, it appears Peder is shirtless underneath.

Polish! As much as I loved the US hardcover, it's still so fun for me to see the variations. This is one I've never received, but I would know from the cover that it's Princess Academy.

Turkish.

And Russian, sent by squeetuser Polly Lu!

Did you guess many? Any favorites?

Comments

[Christina Willson]

I still like te American painted version the best! But I
do think the Polish one is very cute (although reminiscent of George's Tuesday at the Castle haha). Also, the blanket one
is hilarious!!! Thanks for sharing these!

[Sarah Achluophobia]

The Norwegian is hilarious! So is the Italian hardcover! I just read the part in MIA where Charlotte traces the profiles, so that's what the large red profile reminds me of. I love the Polish cover.

[Christen]

Um... wow. The Norwegian one is kinda creepy.

[LotzofunMary mom of 4]

I think my favorites are the Spanish hardcover, French and Polish. I only guessed three languages correctly. I'm not crazy about either English ones, but at least they are better than the Norwegian! ha ha! It made me laugh!

[clairedelune]

That Norwegian one is great.

[Coranne]

The Spanish Hardcover is my favorite! The Norwegian one ... is odd. And the Japanese one creeps me out- what is up with her eyes? I know it is artistic, but she looks like a zombie!

Thanks for posting these- it was fun to look at all of them!

[Kathryn @ Clean Teen Fiction]

I love the Polish cover! That's my fave. The Norwegian cover is a little oooo la la! I like it. I'm not sure I remember that part of the book though. :)

[McKenna]

LOVE the Dutch and Spanish!!! :D Beautiful.

[Enna isilee]

Love! So much love! I've got three of those. :D

[Phogles]

Oh how fun! You should TOTALLY do this with all the international covers. I really love the mood of the French one, but you're right about it not turning enough heads in the USA. The Italian hardcover is cute, but I think a lot of kids would pick up the Japanese one just because anime is so popular. They'd be in for a bit of a surprise, maybe, but it would be a pleasant one. :D

[Abigail]

I LOVE this. Covers are always the first thing that draws me to a book. I know it's against the old adage, but I totally judge books(literally) by their covers all the time. I especially like the Polish and Russian ones.

[lissie]

I like the very first one and the Polish one. The Polish one is my favorite. The Norwegian one is creepy, definitely not what Princess Academy is really like.

[Debz]

I really like the Spanish, Polish, and Russian covers. The Norwegian cover is certainly interesting... If I didn't know it was Princess Academy, I'd guess it's about 2 lost lovers trying to survive on a snowy mountain, which frankly, is not my kind of book.
Can't wait to see more of your foreign covers!

[Tone A]

Also, the Norwegian title means The Mountain Princess. Guess the publisher wanted a different vibe, ha.

[Sarabeth]

I love the Dutch and Korean covers. And the Spanish hardback. It's fun to see their cultural takes on it!

[Bridget]

OMG I would not in a million years pick up that Norwegian version!!!

[Marina]

Of the UK ones, I like the former, as it is a better representation of the book. The latter is pretty and charming, but leads one to believe this is another fluffy bunny princess story. By the way, I LOVE the substance and grit your story actually has!

[Danielle]

The Spanish, second UK one, and the Dutch, Polish and Russian. But that's just me. I think a lot of people in Norway would get the wrong idea about the story if they only looked at the cover! I'm waiting to see other foreign covers!

[Abby]

I love the French one, and the Polish one. I would also love to see more foreign covers please! I'm curious to see what they come up with for Book of a Thousand Days.

[Alexandra]

I bought my copy of Princess Academy from a Scholastic Canada book order, which showed one cover, but ended up giving me the original US cover...and the cover I though I was getting isn't here. It's pretty close to the first UK cover, but it was definitely different. Odd.
And my faves from these covers are the Dutch, Polish and Russian ones. :D

[Alysa (Ruby Diamond)]

Do you think the Norwegian translator slipped a scene or two into the book? haha. And I agree, Alison Jay's is the best!

[Carolynne]

I did some research in World Cat and the book is cataloged there with your name spelled correctly. I'm guessing that one n was a typo (or calligo, maybe?). It would make sense to change the title (Princesses = Prinsessen) but not the author. Spanish, Polish, and Dutch are my favorites.

[Alissa]

My favorite is the Chinese paperback, then Polish, Russian, and Dutch. Very fun to see and compare! Thanks!

[Kim]

Oh, these are so fun to look at! I love the American one best of all, but I also really like the Polish one, the pink English one, the Spanish one, the French one (stunning!), and the Norwegian one (the latter just because it's hilarious!). I like the illustration style of the second Italian one, but it's too bad none of the mini-scenes really have anything to do with your story! How funny! And how wonderful that your book has been translated into so many different languages!

[K.M.B]

I love looking at foreign covers of my favorite books! It's cool too see how different the styles can be.
But I noticed that in a lot of these covers, Miri is blonde. What color hair does Miri really have?

[Ashley R.]

My favorites are Russian, Dutch, and French. Thanks for sharing. :)

[Justina]

My favorite is the Polish! My least favorite is the creepy Norwegian one...?

[Julia]

All of these are extremely awesome! I guess my favorites are the French, Chinese, Polish, and the second UK. Oh, and about the Norwegian cover.....um......what were they thinking?

[David Neumann]

Shannon, when will your works appear in the iBooks store? I was about to get some works for my daughter but they didn't turn up.

[Alison]

I love the original US one (that's the copy I have, but I like the live photo one as well), the first UK, the French, and the Russian. The Norweigian one made me laugh...what WERE they thinking? Maybe they were trying to make it appealing to women and older teenaged girls. But it doesn't fit the story at all! These are lovely, though, it's always interesting to see how stories are imagined in different countries :)

[Alison]

But I really don't like the pink ones, it just doesn't fit with Miri's character or the tone of the book (I think of it more as greens, blues, browns, light greys - outdoor, nature colors)

[Hannah]

I have the first UK one and I remember not really liking it when I bought it (the cover I mean, not the book!). But I'd already read and loved the Goose Girl so luckily I bought it anyway. I love seeing all the different covers together.

[Amie]

I love the polish cover. I feel like if I had picked up the Norwegian version at ten years old my mom probably wouldn't have let me read it...

[Ashley R.]

My favorite of all time is the American photograph. Norwegian.... Um, I like it, but I don't like what it implies. It doesn't fit the story line.

[Lyndsey]

The Polish one is divine.

[Jon]

Love the Chinese/Romanian ones!

[Dr. Sallie N. Cheinsteen]

I guessed the Japanese, because I took it in school. That made me excited. :) And I guessed the Chinese. I didn't guess any of the others, because I was too impatient to see the beautiful covers. I actually really like the Danish one. I LOVE the Spanish, and I like the second UK one better, even though it's bright pink - the hint of mountains and flowers on the cover are a nice touch, I think. The French is also beautiful. All of them are so interesting and fun to look at! Thanks for sharing!

[Lola]

For the UK one, I prefer the first, but that's possibly due to the fact that it's the version I own. :)

[Megha]

I prefer the second UK one.

They're all so pretty! You're a lucky writer ;)

[Dominique]

These were so fun and lovely, thanks for sharing! I loved the French and the Japanese, as well as the second Italian version. The Norwegian cover made me laugh out loud! I would like to see more of these for your other books :)

[Charis]

I love the Polish one, my favourite of the lot, although I do like the French one, which is pretty cute. The characters look exactly like I imagined them. The Norwegian was...... unique? It made me laugh though!

[Stacy Whitman]

I love that the Korean title is just "Princess Academy" spelled out in Hangul. I might just have to find a copy of that and see if I can learn more Korean with a favorite book. :)

[Christine Jensen]

I actually really LOVE the large red profile on the Dutch version, I think that is my favorite cover.

[Other Meredith]

Ooh, the Norwegian one is sexy! Which makes me feel really weird.

[Anna]

Interestingly, the pink Spanish cover is exactly like the Brazilian copy my daughter won at The King's English during your book release party for Midnight in Austenland. My husband served his mission in Brazil and he's been reading it to bone up on his Portuguese. I think he's enjoying so far!

[Enna]

Wow! Seeing al of these covers is so cool! My favortes are the Korean, the second English one, and sort-of the Norweigian one. (only sort-of!!!!)

[Sonya]

A lot of the cruise lines are pulilng out of Alaska, if you going to go, go this year because next year there will be more demand than berths and it's going to get expensive.I have cruised and toured Alaska with Celebrity and it was a great experience. No doubt we could have had a cheaper cruise with Princess, Royal Caribbean, and Costa, or a more expensive cruise with Seaborne. Their ships were all in port at the same time as ours. I mean that there is an abundance of choice, Pick a line and a cruise that suits your budget, goes to places that you want ot explore.Personal opinion Princess is one of the best lines, especially if you want to do a cruise tour, before or after your cruise.

[Alice]

program is a real winner, with eigntxicly packaged classes in such diverse subjects as photography, personal computers, cooking, and pottery (they even recently added scrapbooking to the roster).The Best Ships for Entertainment: Look to the big ships here. Carnival and Royal Caribbean are tops when it comes to an overall package of show productions, nightclub acts, lounge performances, and audience-participation entertainment. Princess also offers particularly well-done if somewhat less lavishly staged shows. Holland America has not, historically, been noted for its entertainment package, but the company has improved considerably in that department in recent years.-Michael

[Firdausi]

I also would have to say Princess because even on the sea days, many aciiittves are related to Alaska like a Reindeer chili cook off, the food, or having an ididerod winner on board to give lectures. But Alaska by far the the most exciting cruise you can take. It is very different from all other cruises.

[Felipe]

Hi Michelle,I've only just recently got into rienadg to relax and my first book was Three Nights in New York! I found myself going to bed earlier and earlier to read it!! I loved it!! I only finished Two Nights in Biarritz last night!!!!! I loved how the characters lives changed after their weekend away but also how it made them stronger women!! Brilliant!! I can't wait to get out to buy One Kiss in Havana!! Keep writing!!!!! Thank you!!!!!