Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/441179
XIV maltatoday, SUNDAY, 4 JANUARY 2015 2014 was a very important year for Merlin Publishers, as we consolidated our growth in two critical areas for us: enriching the corpus of children's literature by translating quality titles into Maltese, and expanding our adult list while retaining its distinctiveness and quirkiness. Merlin publishes few – but very carefully chosen – adult titles each year, and 2014 had three highly varied titles for us. First off in January, Clare Azzopardi's much-awaited return to adult fiction – eight full years after her Il-Linja l-Ħadra – was launched: Kulħadd ħalla isem warajh, a title that went on to critical and reader acclaim and is by all accounts Azzopardi's strongest offering to date. A month later, Merlin published Teodor Reljic's debut novel, Two, which seems to be finally putting a nail into the coffin of the "English novels published locally do not sell", as it was second only to Azzopardi's comeback in sales. For Merlin, this was also quite a departure from its usual genres, and its success has fur- ther encouraged us to seek more such manuscripts. Later in the year, the winner of Merlin's #abbozz literary competi- tion – Mark Vella's debut novel X'Seta' Ġralu lil Kevin Cacciattolo? – was published. Vella's manuscript is a beautifully written, highly emotional take on the world of a boy living in eighties Malta as he grapples with life. The mystery disappearance of the title, is tackled from a different angle in the second half of the novel as a wannabe-investigative journalist toys with whether to dig a bit deeper into this cold case. Just recently, Merlin published possibly its most unusual title to date: Stephan D. Mifsud's The Maltese Bes- tiary, which has been an unexpected hit over Christmas. A hardback compendium of the supernatural lurking around the Maltese islands, it provides a hitherto-uncollected Maltese mythology complete with illustrations of its beasts, entities, flora and fauna. And of course, 2014 was the year that a Merlin publication, Dak li l-lejl iħallik tgħid by Pierre J. Mejlak, de- servedly won the EU Prize for Litera- ture – a coveted EU-wide prize that dramatically increases the visibility of the winning titles on a European level. On the children's literature front, 2014 saw Merlin publishing titles for a wide range of ages, both original novels and literature in translation. Apart from the well-loved stories and adventures, Merlin also experimented with a more "daring" picture book, Il-fabbrika tal-kliem, translated by Clare Azzopardi, that reads both to young children and also to adults as a timeless love story. This Week T E A T R U M A N O E L M A L T A T E A T R U M A N O E L 2015 sĂůůĞƩĂ͕DĂůƚĂ͛ƐĂƌŽƋƵĞĂƉŝƚĂůŝƚLJĂŶĚĂhE^KtŽƌůĚ,ĞƌŝƚĂŐĞ^ŝƚĞ͕ ŚŽƐƚƐƚŚĞƚŚŝƌĚĞĚŝƟŽŶŽĨƚŚŝƐƵŶŝƋƵĞďĂƌŽƋƵĞŵƵƐŝĐĨĞƐƟǀĂůŝŶŝƚƐ dĞĂƚƌƵDĂŶŽĞů͕ďĂƌŽƋƵĞĐŚƵƌĐŚĞƐĂŶĚƉĂůĂĐĞƐ 10 th - 24 th January 2015 ǁǁǁ͘ǀĂůůĞƩĂďĂƌŽƋƵĞĨĞƐƟǀĂů͘ĐŽŵ͘ŵƚ ǁǁǁ͘ƚĞĂƚƌƵŵĂŶŽĞů͘ĐŽŵ͘ŵƚ Saturday 10th – 7.30pm – St Nicholas (All Souls Church) - Nine Lamentations Sunday 11th – 3.30pm – TM Studio Theatre - Toi Toi Children's Baroque Ball Sunday 11th – 11am – Teatru Manoel - Baroque Piano Transcriptions Sunday 11th – 5pm – Teatru Manoel - Music for the Grand Tour Monday 12th – 7.30pm – Ta' Ġieżu Church - The Fruit of Love by Anthony Holborne Tuesday 13th – 7.30pm – President's Palace - South American Baroque Music Wednesday 14th – 7.30pm – Teatru Manoel - Handel Concert Arias Thursday 15th – 7.30pm – Ta' Ġieżu Church - Girolamo Abos Friday 16th – 7.30pm – St. Paul's Anglican Pro Cathedral - Abos, Handel and Steani Saturday 17th – 12 noon – St. Nicholas (All Souls Church) - Bach Cello Suites 1-3-5 Saturday 17th – 7.30pm – Teatru Manoel - Inspired by Baroque: Ravel, Foss, Shostakovich, Strauss Sunday 18th – 11am – Teatru Manoel - Toi Toi Passacaglia Sunday 18th – 12 noon – St Nicholas (All Souls Church) - Bach Cello Suites 2-4-6 Sunday 18th – 5pm – Teatru Manoel - Bach's Goldberg Variations Monday 19th – 7.30pm – St. John's Co-Cathedral - Bach's St. John's Passion Tuesday 20th – 7.30pm – St. Publius Church, Floriana - Michelangelo Falvetti's "Il Diluvio Universale" Wednesday 21st – 7.30pm – St. Paul's Anglican Pro Cathedral - Magnicat Thursday 22nd – 7.30pm – Teatru Manoel - Handel and his London Friends Friday 23rd – 7.30pm – St. Publius Church, Floriana - Le Concert Spirituel Saturday 24th – 12 noon – St. Paul's Anglican Pro Cathedral - Gabrieli and Monteverdi Saturday 24th – 9pm – Teatru Manoel - Baroque Festival Ball 0903. Teatru - Broque - 25x4.indd 1 19/12/2014 10:52 The state of the Two important players in the local book scene offer up some thoughts on how last year's developments may impact readers and publishers in 2015 Chris Gruppetta These are indeed exciting times for the National Book Council. After en- tering into office around a year and a half ago, I have witnessed the growth of the Book Council into a solid institution with a significant budget allocation and newly set-up profes- sional administrative structures. It is only thanks to said structural growth of the entity as a whole that we were able to deliver to the general public last year's successful National Book Festival, which from a book-bazaar type of event, is now developing into a fully-fledged cultural event. This event is changing from the previous 'Book Fair' model in several ways, but it all started simply from a divergence in perspective. Although we would like to strengthen the com- mercial aspect of the Festival, and we definitely would like distributors, book sellers and publishers to make more sales; we are treating the Book Festival, first and foremost, as a cultural event. This is the only way in which such an event is able to remain relevant to a general public which is becoming more demanding in terms of taste and quality. It was such a great pleasure to wit- ness all 50 plus events held during the Festival so well attended, as well as the influx of people browsing through publishers' stands fishing for the latest material. Moreover the French and the Italian exhibitors have expressed great satisfaction with their experience in the Festival, so much so as to guarantee their return; news that strengthens our hope of seeing the Festival regaining an inter- national scope as an event. We surely have a long way to go and I am, by no means implying that we are heralding some form of enlightenment in the local book sec- Mark Camilleri