Today I want to talk about a case of Italian translations gone right. Vaporteppa is an Italian editorial project dedicated to the translation of Steampunk, Sci-Fi and Bizarro novels. The success of this project shows the opportunities offered by the Italian ebook market.

There are currently 11 Vaporteppa ebooks in the Ialian Kindle store. Among these, Gli dei di Mosca (The Gods of Moscow) by Michael Swanwick managed to breach the global top 200, and is still, as I write, nr. 21 among Science Fiction ebooks. This is a significant accomplishment for a book by an author who didn’t have any “live” Italian translations (just pirated scans and some stuff you could find only on eBay), and that belongs to a genre (Post-Apocalyptic Sci-Fi) traditionally not very well known in Italy. The quality of the translation and a smart price (5 euro for a medium-length book) made it possible for the ebook to be chosen for Amazon’s monthly deals, which is a huge sign of success (and also the reason you’re seeing it priced at 1,99 euro).

Another author for which Vaporteppa’s head editor, Marco Carrara, has reported very satisfying sales is Carlton Mellick III. Before Vaporteppa, Bizarro Fiction had a grand total of one book available in Italian (Help! A Bear is Eating Me!, with the translated title of Missione in Alaska), and Mellick was unknown to the Italian public; yet his translated books proved quite profitable.

All this shows there is room for translated authors in the Italian market, even if they were previously unknown to the Italian public. Check out my “What is it that you do?” page to know how you can have your book translated into Italian for a very reasonable price, and contact me for questions and business proposals. 🙂