A TALE OF TWO AUTHORS AND THEIR QUEST FOR A BOOK DEAL OVERSEAS
▶ Emirati authors Jalal Luqman and Khaled bin Hamad tell Saeed Saeed of their quest for an international audience
Getting a book out to the marketplace is an arduous process and writing it is only part of the journey. Once the intensive penning of the piece comes to an end, a near endless run of meetings to discuss various painstaking aspects, such as editing, illustration, copyright and translation rights, begins, before the book ends up in the store.
And that’s if the writer has the luxury of being snapped up by a reputable publishing house. Without such support that challenge becomes almost insurmountable.
Jalal Luqman is used to such challenges. The Abu Dhabi-born Emirati author is no stranger to doing things alone. As well as being a successful multimedia artist and running his own events company, Luqman spent four years making a short film, 40 Dirhams, a dark comedy about the power of money, which screened in Abu Dhabi last year.
Although the movie was partially funded by the Abu Dhabi Music and Arts Foundation, Luqman recalls that the money ran out fast and the film suffered delays as most of the Emirati cast and crew were undertaking National Service.
Nevertheless, the satisfaction of completing that task propelled him to rekindle a long dormant writing project, The Armagondas, a six-part English fantasy novel series set in the imaginary Crohelic Empire. With another grant from the Abu Dhabi Music and Arts Foundation, Luqman self-published the book and launched it in April during the Abu Dhabi International Book Fair. Satisfied by the local response, Luqman flew to the world’s largest book fair, in Frankfurt, Germany, thanks to a grant from the Ministry of Culture and Knowledge Development, in search of an international publishing deal.
Before the book fair concluded yesterday, Luqman spent each day meeting publishers to discuss ways of bringing his debut novel series to an international audience, and ultimately the big screen. He was also granted a royal audience after providing a copy to the Ruler of Sharjah, Sheikh Dr Sultan bin Mohammed Al Qasimi, who toured the book fair on Wednesday.
“It is invigorating as this is the place to be if you are serious about your literary work,” Luqman tells me at the Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum Knowledge Foundation pavilion at the fair. “The who’s who of the book world is here and it has been great to chat with them and learn things along the way. I am also an artist, so I see what I write, in a way. What I would love to do here is find somebody, such as a literary agent, to carry the book forward and eventually portray it into the screen.”
Luqman acknowledges his quest is ambitious but points to the fact that he has proven naysayers wrong by completing 40 Dirhams.
His idea for The Armagondas began 25 years ago, a time span that has taught him patience is a necessity for most creative endeavours. “I still have some of the early outlines of the story that I wrote on napkins from that time,” he says. “I learnt that it is about perseverance and not being scared of rejection. I mean, Gone with the Wind was rejected 192 times as a novel, while the first Harry Potter book was rejected 13 times. So, in a way, I still have to pay my dues when it comes to being rejected. It is part of that journey.”
That aspect of the creative life Khaled bin Hamad knows only too well. The comic book author and illustrator who lives in Dubai has been facing his own struggles in the UAE to convince local publishers that his English-language manga manuscript is worth their investment. Like Luqman, he received a government grant, and he has been spending the days meeting publishers from Europe, Japan and the United States. He says their professional feedback has been rewarding.
“To be honest with you, I came here searching for the validation I couldn’t find back home. And that’s nobody’s fault, it’s just that publishers in the UAE didn’t understand what I was doing,” he says. “So through these meetings with international publishers who are aware of manga comics, those interactions have been amazing.”
Hamad’s fictional tale is set in the region during the Abbasid Caliphate (from the 8th to the 14th century), considered to be the Islamic Golden Age, his narrative is far removed from the negative portrayals of Islam seen in the media today, and publishers were interested in that. With some telling Hamad more discussions will take place on his work after the book fair, he already views his Frankfurt mission as a success.
At the end of a long day of meetings, both Emirati authors are confident their books will eventually reach an international audience. “It took me over 20 years to write this book, so spending the next 20 years getting it published is nothing for me,” Luqman says. “This means, it is going to happen, period.”
Hamad nods. “I have been working hard, day and night, to get my manuscript done,” he says. “The work will be published. There is no way this won’t happen.”