Laskar Pelangi to be sold in US next year, publisher says

Critically acclaimed and multiple award-winning Indonesian novel Laskar Pelangi (Rainbow Troops) will be available for purchase in US bookstores next year, its publisher says.

Ditta Sekar Cempaka of Bentang Pustaka, the novel’s original publisher, said the US sales of the book would be handled by Farrar, Straus and Giroux (FSG), a publishing house renowned for publishing Nobel-winning works of literature.

She said that the best-selling novel, which tells the story of poor children trying to get an education on a remote island in Indonesia, was currently being edited in its English version.

“At the moment, the novel is being edited by Sarah Crichton,” she said Thursday, as quoted by tempo.co.

According to Ditta, a number of publishers in Europe and Asia had also expressed interest in publishing Laskar Pelangi. One of those interested, she added, was Italian publisher Rizzoli, who has published Italian versions of Eat, Pray and Love and Three Cups A Tea.

Bentang Budaya published Laskar Pelangi in 2005, which was the first of a trilogy of books, those following being Sang Pemimpi (The Dreamer), Edensor and Maryamah Karpov. (awd)