Best Week Ever

Posted on by scott

And it’s only Wednesday.

Actually the good stuff started on the weekend, when Justine and I went to the Humble Teen Lit Fest, as mentioned in my last post. It was awesome. We had about 1,000 attendees, the organization was smooth as silk, and all the guests were a blast.

After Chris Crutcher’s moving keynote address, I took over the gym for my two sessions—though, alas, I was not allowed to take control of the scoreboard. I got to talk to about 500 kids altogether, including one girl wearing painful-looking Peeps contact lenses. Thanks to everyone who asked questions. Without you question-askers I am a very boring man.

Then came two solid hours of signing, one of the more fun hand-cramps I’ve ever experienced. Everyone was just so enthusiastic. After that, Justine and I went out with a passle of librarians and my uncle (a principal in the district) for Mexican food. It was a splendid day. Many thanks to everyone who made it happen.

Here’s Justine’s version.

And the week has stayed wonderful. Today my pals at Simon & Schuster messengered over this little artifact:

Yes, that’s the Japanese cover for Uglies. And it’s so. Very. Cool.

But the coolness doesn’t stop on the outside. Observe the inside flap:

That’s the traditional meet-the-characters spread. Luckily, I have a micro-smattering of Japanese from college days. Rightmost is, of course, Tally. On the left-hand page are:

upper right: Peris
upper left: David
lower right: Shay
lower left: Dr. Cable

If you want to decode the katakana yourself, use this table to work out the names are pronounced in Japanese. I must admit that the romanization of “David” is freaking me out.

UPDATE: From the way this post was written, it must have looked like this is a manga version of Uglies. But it’s just a novel with a few illustrations. Like these:

Here’s the party scene, with Peris in his tux and Tally clutching a pig mask and looking crumpled.

And here’s the all-important hoverboard shot!

This is just so cool, I can die now. (Well, maybe after a manga version gets created and translated.)

Thanks to Angharad Kowal at S&S foreign rights for selling it, Sony Magazines for buying it, Ken Tanizaki for translating it, and KAZUAKI for adding the visuals.

Update 2: Here’s a link to Amazon.jp, for those of you mad enough to buy a book you can’t read for four or five cool illustrations.

89 thoughts on “Best Week Ever”

  3. hey savannah… did you say totaly enough??? haha im on the phone with you right now!!!THATS OK THOUGH YOUR STILL FOOL.. I GUESS 🙂

  4. hey savannah… did you say totaly enough??? haha im on the phone with you right now!!!THATS OK THOUGH YOUR STILL FOOL.. I GUESS 🙂

  5. good job nerd! posting it twice! That was totally smooth. Thats right… I said TOTALLY!!! Dont pick on just because your jelous of my fawsome vocabulary! BLONDE!

  7. haaha you had a typo!!!! AND YES IM BLONDE AND PROUD!!!!!!! im not pickin on you you nerd!! 🙂 and im fooler than you!!! im TOTALY fawesome and you know it!!!

  13. okay this is getting useless and spam-ish like. I Love David, Peris Is Pretty, Beye-ya peace out homie

  15. Ohh! They already have Pretties on here, too! Oh man, I totally wish I could read Japanese more fluently. I want it. I WANT it.
    What a waste of money if I can’t read it, but I don’t care. I’ll be able to read it someday!

  17. Weell, i do think the hover board scene was very bubbly…buutt…every char looks soo…wrong..idk..its just i pictured them more..erm..idk. Peris looks almost TOO girly and Tally…no..she didnt look like that in my mind. and David looks totally..well..bubble-headed! idk..sry but the pics are kinda odd 2 me..anyone else agree?

  19. Oh yeah..and…erm..i have a question about Tally..Does she REALLY look like that in YOUR mind??

  20. That was pretty cool!! Do you think they’ll (hollywood) end up making a movie about the trilogy?? I think the Japanese version would be awesome though!!

    Btw, love your books!! Gonna start reading Midnighters soon! Have a good week!

  21. Wow…I never thought they would make a manga out of Uglies. Now I’m determined to lear Japanese and go buy it!! X3 I looove manga.

  22. this is embarising to abmit but I thought that the mangaised David was Dr. Cable.
    What is with Dr. Cable’s hair??

  24. Tally-wa is soo cute, that’s pretty close to how I imagined her. But Peris looks… different…. Same with David. I didn’t picture him like that at all! And I’m not quite sure what I think of Dr. Cable’s hair… lol. Overall though I really like it!

    I love manga anyway so… YAY! ^_^

  25. That’s so amazing! All the characters look quite close to what I would have thought in real life! I’d be so bubbly if I could get my hands on a copy of the manga version! Totaly bubbly-making! I love it!:)

  26. Aw…i was skimming through ur blog
    (i wasn’t able to read it for some time now..not with my little visit to NY ((my first time)) during spring break.. ((which ends this monday T_T)) )
    and I saw the pictures of this entry and I almost had a heart attack.
    My friends and I are loyal devotees to three things: 1.) Books such as yours…preferably something that has to do with the supernatural..(but uglies,pretties,and specials are AWESOME too) 2.) internet. need I say more? 3.) MANGA! ANIME! *lists hundreds of manga titles*

    But when I looked closely at the entry I was somewhat dissapointed…
    but this is close enough! xD Too bad I failed many times at trying to read japanese!

  27. This is aweseome, I looked around on amazon.jp and it looks like they divided Uglies into two parts. The first part, like someone pointed out, is called “Atashi ga kirei ni naru hi”(The Day I Become Beautiful) and the second part is called “Minikui jibun ni sayonara” (Goodbye to my Ugly Self).

  28. ok, I know this is a late blog entry, but THAT is so cool! Not only do i love this book, but my favourite art style is manga…sweet:)

  29. Tally is better-looking than paris is, I had always pictured uglies as having this akward, charming cuteness while pritties as too perfect.

  31. Hey!
    I’ve read all of the UGLIES trilogy, and i’m about to start reading PEEPS, and i’m planning on getting THE LAST DAYS afterwards.
    I just wanted to let you know that you are the most amazing author i’ve never known of, and that you should deffinatly continue writing books like you do, because all of the ones that i have read are absolutley amazing.

    Your biggest fan,
    Emily

  32. That is made of win. =D

    David wasn’t how I expected (I kinda expected Peris’ face to be longer and not so…boy-like) but Shay and Tally are pretty close to perfect! Doctor Cable’s hair… a little weird.

    *looks around wildly, hoping manga will make it to Kinokuniya in Sydney sometime soon*

  34. Some of this people are mean to you. Well I wanted to say that I loved the ugilies, pretties, and the speicals. It would also make a good movie series too.

  37. zane zane zane zane need zane can’t breathe… i see a light but where’s zane….? he’s not at the end of the dark tunnel! he’s not dead! *breathing comes back* zane! where r u??? well all i know is that ur out there somewhere, wait for me zane!

  38. Very beautiful illustration as always! I always love Japanese manga and anime! I know that this isn’t one but…well…the illustration of the characters are not how I imagine them though. I think that the romanji for David in which katerate translated was wrong…it shouldn’t be Teuitudo…I think that it should be devishido. As:

    デ= de
    ヴィ= vi
    ã‚·= shi
    ド = do
    the katakana table in which Mr Westerfeld provided was too limited. Perhaps you can try the table from Wikipedia at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katakana which has more Katakana. =^.^=

  39. Thought that I will translate all the names.

    UGLIES
    ã‚¢ a
    ã‚° gu
    リ ri-
    ズ zu

    david
    デ de
    ヴィ vi
    ã‚· shi
    ド do

    shay
    ã‚· shi
    エ e

    tally
    ã‚¿ ta
    リ ri-

    peris
    ペ pe
    リ ri
    ス su

    Dr. Cable
    ド do
    ク ku
    ã‚¿ ta-
    ケ ke-
    ブ bu

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