A 'Curious' Coincidence

In Britain, young adult readers read Mark Haddon's novel at the same time as grownups

by Robert Rorke -- Publishers Weekly, 7/18/2005

In Britain, Christopher John Francis Boone, the protagonist of Mark Haddon's The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time, so captivated the British publishing industry that when his story was published, in 2003, it was printed in two editions—one for adults and one for young adults.

The manuscript, about an autistic savant who investigates the death of a neighborhood pet, was offered to adult (Jonathan Cape) and young adult (Random House) at the same time. According to David Fickling, Haddon's YA editor, the working out of the deal was a curious incident of corporate synergy. "Because [Dan Franklin at Jonathan Cape} and I wanted Mark and his book so much and as we are all part of Random House, we decided—though I can't remember who suggested it, perhaps Mark himself—that the best thing to do was that we should both publish: so we did both an adult and a young people's edition. Voila!

There was no concern, apparently, that making the book available to two kinds of readers would hinder its sales potential. Each edition had its own jacket design and the books were sold in different sections of bookstores. Says Fickling; "The literary novel market is so different to the children's book market here in the U.K. that they don't intersect much. Also, the sales profiles are very different. As a result, the book has gone absolutely everywhere."

In the end, the sales of Curious Incident among adults outnumbered those for young adults three-to-one.

When the novel was published in the United States, there was only one edition, for adults.