Women in Translation Readathon 2020

Wait, what, I have reading interests outside Shakespeare?!

Last summer I wrote a piece on Women in Translation month that you can read HERE if you’re looking for a primer on what this is all about!

Every August the wonderful Matthew, Kendra, and Jennifer from booktube host the Women in Translation Readathon – this year it’s taking place from August 24th – 31st.  There are 3 prompts this year:

Prompts (bonus for any if the translator is also a woman!):
1. Read a book published by an independent press
2. Read a genre title (SFF, romance, crime, thriller, horror, etc.)
3. Read a book that was published in its original language pre-2000

My own TBR is as follows:

Prompt 1 – Disoriental by Négar Djavadi, translated from the French by Tina A. Kover (published by Europa Editions)

Prompt 2 – The Perfect Nanny by Leila Slimani, translated from the French by Sam Taylor (thriller)
OR
Out by Natsuo Kirino, translated from the Japanese by Stephen Snyder (thriller – also works for prompt #3, originally published in 1997)

Prompt 3 – Abigail by Magda Szabó, translated from the Hungarian by Len Rix (originally published in 1970)

My big priority here is Disoriental, but I will be getting to as many of these as I can that week!

But this year there’s an exciting component to the readathon that affects me – and potentially all of you!

If you’ve wanted to try your hand at written reviews but don’t have your own platform (or maybe you have a smaller platform that you’re looking to grow), there are two exciting options.  You can review ANY book by a woman in translation and submit your pieces to Jennifer – they’ll either be featured in Open Letters Review or here on my blog!  Guidelines below:

Written Review Options:
1) Open Letters Review (https://openlettersreview.com/): Any full reviews of 2019-2020 releases. Send to me by Sunday, September 6th and she’ll edit them so they can run on the site. Welcome to send before that date as well! Typical review is 600-800 words. (Contact: jreadersense@gmail.com)
2) Pace, Amore, Libri (https://paceamorelibri.wordpress.com/): Rachel has agreed to host shorter bits about WIT books published in any year on her blog! We’ll be doing a collective piece: people can contribute 6 sentences per title, 2 titles maximum per person, and we’ll run them as a big recommendations post together. Deadline for this will also be Sunday, September 6th. (Contact: jreadersense@gmail.com)

I’m SO excited to see what you guys come up with!

P.S. Trans women are women ❤