This year’s October was really busy for the Macadamia team. Not only did we visit the book fairs in Frankfurt and Cracow (as every year), but for the first time we attended the Spanish Book Fair LIBER, which was hosted by Barcelona this time. Our visit was initiated and supported by the Spanish Embassy in Poland and we would like to extend our sincere gratitude for all the help we received from Ms. Anna Mierzejewska of Department of Commerce.

We decided that Kamila would be our proud representative and so off she went to have many interesting meetings that, we hope, will turn into something really promising for our clients and Macadamia. First of all, thanks to this unique opportunity, Kamila was able to have a longer than a standard (at the fair) thirty minute meeting with Alba Adell from IMC Literary Agency, so we traded a “quick date” for a long, two hour conference to discuss IMC’s titles in details. Kamila also met agency’s employees and toured IMC’s premises.

Additionally, Karolina Jaszecka, a translator and scout for the Spanish book market, shared with Kamila her views and suggestions on the local book market, hence letting us understand it better.

Finally, a visit at the LIBER was a tremendous chance to look at the Spanish book market as a whole, observe the trends, ways of promoting titles and the design of the covers.

Therefore, even though the weather was not always favourable (rains) and returning from Barcelona only to board the plane to Frankfurt turned out to be quite challenging, we’re deeply grateful for this opportunity, since we had an amazing chance to learn so much more about the Spanish market, enhance our relationship with the great IMC Literary Agency, and last but not least – Kamila is entirely content with the choice of tapas she was able to sample ;)

But as mentioned above, right after Barcelona, there was Frankfurt Book Fair – an event we have a love-hate relationship with.

„Love” – because, well, there’s everything we love: books, fantastic people, evening drinks :) “Hate” – because the fair can be truly tiring: tight schedule, constant running between halls… This event absorbs our time and attention long before it even begins, and we often book our first meetings at the beginning of summer!

The Fair itself (68th, for that matter) is the time to meet with our awesome clinents from the States, UK, Germany, Australia, Italy, Brazil, the Netherlands… We talk about successes of the passing year, enjoy discussing new titles and watching colorful picture books and cookbooks… and yes, we do gossip – just a little bit!

Every year during the Fair there is this one title that everybody in the agents’ center (and some of the booths in the halls) talk about. We are pleased to announce that this year’s discovery of the fair was a title from one of our clients, The Bent Agency. Foreign rights to “Nevermoor” trilogy have already been sold to almost twenty countries (Poland included, of course), and the list of licences is still growing!

Upon coming back to Warsaw, the only thing we dream of is some good rest. We don’t have too much time for this though, because…

Right after Frankfurt the whole Polish publishing world leaves for Cracow. It’s an ideal sequence because we can present there the hottest titles about which we found out in Germany.

We love Cracow and we do so especially in autumn. Nearby villages, trees changing colours, pumpkin fields, tents with flowers ready for All Saints’ Day – these are all signs preceding our Cracow visit. This year we met with some publishers at their beautiful offices and with others we had a chance to chat at the Expo Kraków venue. It turned out that two days full of books were still not enough to see everyone and discuss every issue.

It was the 20th International Book Fair in Cracow with more than 700 exhibitors from 25 countries, 759 authors from Poland and abroad and about 68,000 visitors. We took part in the event for the 4th time and can’t wait till next year!