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***EDIT*** The YouTube video is working again. I’ve now got audio download and iTunes options up as well. Please note my microphone (Carl) seemingly was on silent mode. It was coming through fine to the people on the Hangout, but apparently not on playback. It’s a new mic and the settings were wrong. It will be fixed for next week. Sorry!
Welcome to another episode of the Self-Publishing Roundtable, the weekly interview show for self-publishing authors. This week we interview Courtney Milan.
For those of you unaware, Courtney is a NYT and USA Today Bestseller of Historical romances. Although she is technically a hybrid author, she’s been exclusively self-publishing since late 2011. You can find more about her here.
I’ve been a big fan of Courtney’s intelligent and straight talking blog posts regarding the traditional and Indie industries since I first started researching self-publishing back in 2011. Courtney always approaches a discussion-be it on her own blog, or a comment on someone else’s emotionally charged blog- with cool rationality and intelligence. She brings knowledge and class to every discussion she enters in, so I’ve been dying to bring her onto the show. We’ve been waiting for the perfect subject matter to present itself to invite her on, and then BOOM-there it was: Foreign translations.
There is tremendous interest among Indie authors on how to go about translating their books for foreign markets. Germany, for example, is a hot market right now for many genres. However translation fees can be outrageously high and the services often sub-par, so how does one go about translating their books without losing their bank account to an unscrupulous translator?
Courtney, as it happens, just translated several of her books into German, French, Italian, and Spanish, and she’ll be talking about her experience with these foreign translations.
We expect this show will be of great interest to Indie authors, so we’ll have a couple of show hosts cruising the comments. If you have a question for Courtney, post it in the comments and one of the hosts will send it on to the show hangout where we’ll ask it on air.
We will also be joined by two special co-hosts and previous guests of the show. Romance authors, Brenna Aubrey and Cristin Harber. We are excited to have both of these lovely ladies back with us on the show.
If you could, please take the time to like and subscribe to us on You Tube, or leave us an iTunes review. We’d be very grateful.
I’ll be unable to watch live again (stupid work) but have a question if you would be so kind as to pass it on at the correct time. While looking into German translations I stumbled across the results of a survey that was taken by German literary translators. It included information like cost per word/character/line that they charge as well as royalty rates. The latter caught my attention. I realise that the translator’s translation of your writing is their IP, so I guess this is where the royalty part of it comes in. Was this–the translator’s IP and/or royalties–an issue? Did it come up at all when you had your work translated and if so, how did you deal with it?
Thanks in advance 🙂
BatmanErica That’s a great question Erica. I hadn’t heard that some translators required a share of the royalties. I’ll be sure to ask this of Courtney.
Ready to learn how to get your book translated?
Roll call! Who’s here?
And we’ll be running slightly late today, as we are having some tech issues with good old Google plus. 🙂
I’m here, Wade. Sent here by Clover Autrey. Looking forward to it.
OK refresh for the video embed!
Here!
Amy Gamet Thanks for joining us.
Amy Gamet welcome!
Allo!
beautifuleyespriest Hi! Thanks for being here.
beautifuleyespriest Welcome to the roundtable
Hey, party people!
How do you find a legitimate translator? I can speak, okay, defend myself in other languages. However, that’s a long way from being able to translate a manuscript. Many people think they speak a language, but are barely able to communicate.
Evening.
Darren Wearmouth Dazza
Darren Wearmouth Hey, Darren
Hey Darren
Is David going to pimp his services for cover art?
Darren Wearmouth Hell no. I only do covers for our stuff and LExi Maxxwell
If you have questions for Courtney on translations make sure to leave them here for us in the chat. We will get to them for you.
thedavidwwright Darren Wearmouth and for Dr Hans Uberass.
thedavidwwright Darren Wearmouth I meant being a model.
Darren Wearmouth thedavidwwright Shitless dude covers he means Dave.
Carl Sinclair Does she have translated audio? Haven’t heard of that before. I’d also be curious if Courtney has, did she listen to the production?
Darren Wearmouth thedavidwwright Well, then, of course.
Courtney, what if you hire the translator as effectively a W-2 employee (rather than trying work-for-hire on a freelance basis). Does that potentially get around the moral rights? How are the big publishers getting around it because some of the articles I’ve read indicate they are.
Hit us with some comments dudes. 47 of you listening!
HELLLOOOOO
JayChastain Chastain….
Does Courtney have an agent? Would she consider or does she have traditional deals overseas. Apologies if this is a silly question.
Carl Sinclair JayChastain Sin…clair.
The only way I sell books is with special webcam shows.
JayChastain Carl Sinclair Off topic. Was that game arena or premade deck?
JayChastain That’s how I met you.
Carl Sinclair JayChastain Premade, ranked
Carl Sinclair JayChastain It’s how Darren met me too
JayChastain Carl Sinclair I’ll never forget the leopard skin mankini.
Darren Wearmouth JayChastain Carl Sinclair Few people can
JayChastain Darren Wearmouth Carl Sinclair It’s my screensaver.
I wish I had a question, but I have zero knowledge about translation soooo this is all just new quality info for me
Carl Sinclair JayChastain Darren Wearmouth That warms my soul, Carl.
JayChastain Ask her who her favorite class is in Hearthstone maybe?
How does Courtney receive emails from foreign fans in their native language? How are they handled?
Carl Sinclair JayChastain I’m really fond of the Priest right now…but that could be because of my childhood…
JayChastain Carl Sinclair Snort.
JayChastain Carl Sinclair Wow…. there is a line.
Cool. Thanks.
JayChastain Carl Sinclair I’m all in on Mage, Warlock & Paladin.
I’m with Carl on this one. I can’t believe you people don’t appreciate the beauty of a perfect cover drive 🙁
Ask more questions immediately. We have nothing left but Cricket, Pokemon Erotica and Hearthstone questions.
Darren Wearmouth Bastards.
Darren Wearmouth Perfect Cover Drive? Can we get a translator for that?
jlward Darren Wearmouth A lovely shot played off the front or back foot through the covers?
Carl Sinclair How much of the translated book has Courtney attempted to read. Does it get less and less as the initial novelty wore off? Or does she go to a favourite passage and see how it rolls?
Question for the other panelists… Do you have any translations in the works?
Carl Sinclair jlward Darren Wearmouth Perfect translation Carl!
Amy Gamet I know Trish is having some of her work translated to German. I’m not sure on the others.
Amy Gamet Just my cam show transcripts.
At what point did you start thinking seriously about translations?
JayChastain I think she sorta answered this. Whenever you like, but it makes more sense to do it when you have the money and market to justify it.
Dave, did you sell them German language rights?
Hello everyone
David Anson Anson…
How’s my audio folks – I’ve got a new mic but I had no testing on it. I may have it on the wrong setting.
Carl Sinclair It’s a bit low.
thedavidwwright Carl Sinclair I was asking people off the show.
JayChastain When you’re making so much money you don’t NEED to sell overseas, ironically.
Carl Sinclair Sounds fine here
Carl Sinclair thedavidwwright Which setting are you using? I use the third, which looks like an upside down love-heart.
I can drop the tone VERY quickly.
WHAT THE SHIT. I tried, DAVE
Darren Wearmouth and the microphone references begin.
I like gauntlets of pain.
jlward Darren Wearmouth Yeah how is your giant microphone today?
So when I finally write the first Regency dinosaur romance “The Duke Was a Dino” I can expect an invite?
cmdrsue We can line that show up right now. What are you doing the third Thursday of August?
cmdrsue Of course. We’ll write your forewords for you.
Carl Sinclair jlward Darren Wearmouth Standing to attention.
Darren Wearmouth Carl Sinclair jlward the head on mine is bigger.
Went on a beer run. Is there a after party?
JayChastain The comments crash on the site. Then everyone left.
Carl Sinclair JayChastain See. That’s how you know I’m a true fan.
JayChastain I’m not sure
If anyone is up for an after party, let us know in the comments
Trish McCallan The ladies have left. But Trish and I are in with Darren and Jay.
Carl Sinclair Trish McCallan I’m coming!
JayChastain Carl Sinclair Trish McCallan too much info.
Carl Sinclair JayChastain Trish McCallan LOLOL
There is a problem with YouTube downloading the video. It hasn’t happened yet. The audio option is delayed until I can access the video for the audio.
Carl Sinclair I was just trying to watch it and was wondering what happened to the video.
melissadonovan Carl SinclairThere’s something wrong with the video, Melissa? At what point in the video do you have problems? What happens?
jlward melissadonovanCarl SinclairWhen I press play, it says, “The live event is over.” Same on YouTube.
melissadonovan jlwardCarl SinclairI was just looking at this. YouTube says the video is there, but I’m not able to access it at the moment. Hopefully, it’s just going through whatever YouTube does to videos after the recordings have finished.
Thanks for bringing this up. We’re looking into it.
jlward melissadonovan Carl Sinclair Hi Melissa. I already noted this (and made this comment) when I was trying to pull the audio feed earlier. LIke John said, I’m assuming it’s YouTube taking longer than usual to process the video. I hope so anyway. We’ll just have to wait for them to finish.
Video and Audio options are back up. YouTube resolved itself and I’ve been able to finally get the audio pulled for mp3 and iTunes options.
Carl Sinclair Awesome. Thanks! Watching now.
What an awesome and interesting podcast. Fluent in three languages, I’ve been an interpreter for 24 years, and can easily go from one language to a second, and to a third. I’m also a writer and work full time outside the home. Lately, I’ve considered starting my own “Book Translation” business but wasn’t sure where to begin. This podcast was most helpful and has given me a lot to go on.
Thank you, Courtney MIlan et al for your expertise on the subject. I’m very thankful that someone sent me the link for this podcast.
Blessings!
Renee-Ann <><