Over the last 12 months I’ve learnt an enormous amount about the international publishing industry. Wow. It’s a weird kind of business, actually. And nothing has taught me more than seeing the different approaches international publishers have taken when publishing Addition.

For instance, here in Australia the jacket looks like this:

It’s clearly a romance: rose-red jacket, snuggling toothbrushes. A lovely quote from the very generous Sigrid Thornton on the front, reminding us that Addition is, in fact, a love story.

In the UK, it looks like this:

They clearly need a few laughs in the UK at the moment, because there Addition is a comedy. Happy yellow colour, flippant lemon tart on the front. And, in case you missed it, it says ‘A comedy that counts’ right on the front.

In the US, when it’s published in February it will be in hardback:

Here it’s all about the emotional impact, and the writing. The fact that it’s a hardback is a bit weird to me; everywhere else it’s a paperback. My wonderful US editor had quite a lot of impact in the finished book and was constantly asking me to increase the emotional effect on the reader. She felt that the writing was too subtle and in a number of places I think she was right. The finished book is definitely better thanks to her input.

The Netherlands has a different view:

This is quite serious. Lots of numbers on the front, no romance or comedy at all. In fact, a serious newspaper interviewed me about Addition being “an ode to life, to attentiveness”.

Finally, here is the Serbian one:

As might be expected, they’ve focused on the Serbian inventor Nikola Tesla, who features prominently in Addition. I love the ruler along the side, and the girl in the skivvy, of course. (Not enough skivvies on book jackets these days, in my view.) As to the bird? Your guess is as good as mine.

So, with all these different views of the one book, what’s right? What kind of book is Addition, really? Honestly, each and every one of these labels astonished me at the time. I just didn’t label Addition at all when I was writing it. I just knew I had a certain story to tell and that I had a certain writing style. I hope that happens with my next book too. My plan is to just concentrate on each word on each page and let the marketing people tell me what it is when it’s finished.