We are delighted to officially announce that THIS KINGDOM WILL NOT KILL ME – Maggie the Undying volume 1 has found a home with Tor UK.
Tor UK, an imprint of Pan Macmillan, is delighted to announce the acquisition of This Kingdom Will Not Kill Me, an extraordinary epic fantasy by bestselling author duo Ilona Andrews. Publisher Bella Pagan acquired UK and Commonwealth rights from Chris Scheina at Tor US for this and two further novels in this trilogy.
We are super excited to work with Tor UK. This means more buying options for the UK Horde, like Waterstones, a wider distribution, and a greater availability of the book in ebook and in print. No more waiting for weeks for the books to arrive from the US. No more cancelled orders due to “lack of availability.” Massive win there.
Furthermore, this edition will be specifically geared toward UK readers, and Tor UK is known for releasing beautiful books. They are also known for publishing unusual, out-of-the-box fiction, which means This Kingdom will be in excellent hands. While portal fantasy/isekai trope dominates in anime and comic format, there haven’t been that many attempts to bring it into the literary world, so we are very grateful Tor UK took a chance on it.
Also, we’ve interacted by email, and they are so nice to work with.
On a personal note, neither Gordon nor I believe ourselves to be legendary. We are just very happy that we finally have a UK publisher committed to supporting our books in such a big way.
This brings me to the slightly more bothersome news.
This Kingdom Begs Forgiveness From the UK Horde
This part of the post is for READERS WHO ORDER FROM AMAZON UK.
If you reside in US and/or order from Amazon.com, none of the stuff below applies to you. Your preorders are NOT affected.
If you have preordered This Kingdom on Amazon UK, you probably noticed that your preorder has been cancelled and funds have been refunded. This means that any Amazon UK customers who preordered This Kingdom will need to re-preorder the book.
Before any further explanations, here is the correct Amazon UK link and well as the Waterstones one:
The price is exactly the same. Tor UK was most gracious about making sure that everything matched and the Horde would not lose out.
Why did this happen?
This is one of those cases where the problem is unavoidable, and it’s nobody’s fault. The foreign rights sale process for US titles usually goes like so:
- US publisher acquires the book
- The book is edited
- US publisher formally accepts the manuscript after edits
- The book is presented to foreign (from US point of view) publishers
- Foreign publishers read the book and, hopefully, make an offer to purchase it for their territory
Sometimes a book is really hot, and everybody bids on it sight unseen, but most of the time this is how the foreign sales happen. On the US side, there is a delay between initial signing of the contract and the actual acceptance of the book, which can be months or sometimes years.
Tor US bought This Kingdom 1 year and 4 months ago, in February 2024. Tor UK didn’t have a chance to read the manuscript until this year. Meanwhile, Amazon’s US listing went on sale and naturally flowed to Amazon UK. This is standard procedure, because if the foreign rights are not sold in the UK, at least the readers who order from Amazon UK would have a chance to purchase the book from the US.
We are so sorry for the inconvenience this has caused. There was no way to prevent it, but we deeply apologize all the same.
On a personal note, we are so excited for this partnership. If the book does well, maybe we will finally make it over to the UK to meet all of you. Fingers crossed.
I did make made my pre-order on Amazon.de, so I wonder which book it will be on the German market… UK is definitely closer.
Wish I got to translate your books (into German)!
Congratulations!
There are two books on Amazon.de:
ISBN 978-1035089376
To be pulished 2.4.26
And
ISBN-13 978-1250377265
to be Published 31.3.26
Both the Hardcover Editions.
I ordered the one, that comes out 31.3.26.
I think, this will be the US Edition.
Will see, if both will be avalaible on Amazon.de.
Perhaps I preorder both, I want the sprayed edges.😉
Waterstone I do not know.🫣
Congratulations HA.
For me, Amazon UK seem to have just replaced the USD pre-order with a GBP equivalent without me needing to do anything.
What is most likely happening is that the information has not yet been processed by the system and your preorder has not been cancelled yet.
Easiest way to check: the new (correct) preorder shows the publisher as “Tor”. The old one displays “Tor Books” 🙂
There have been a fair number of isekai stories in sf. The weren’t called that, but they were there. The first one that I can think of was “A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court”. Andre Norton made a career out of them. (She also made a career out of a great many other categories, too. 🙂 ) John Carter could be considered isekai.
Splitting hairs here, but to qualify as isekai the character has to be transported to another world 🙂
Simply moving through time in our own world/universe doesn’t quite cut it.
Ooooh, so according to this rule, would moving through a multiverse be considered isekai or not? 🤔
I love these kinds of broad philosophical discussions that have zero stakes, don’t mind me 😁
OK, that lets out Yankee, but John Carter and Witch World still count!
Any idea if there would be special editions of the book? I’ve seen Waterstone do a lot of special editions of books before. Would love to see spray painted edges, signed, or specially stamped hard covers!
Atm, there are no official details about the UK edition, the acquisition announcement only went live yesterday 🙂 , but we expect beautiful things!
Just fyi, UK here, followed that link, and my pre-order still exists.
I’m hoping that continues to be the case as I’m horribly forgetful. Great news on the Tor UK situation, long may the partnership continue.
Hi Laura, it seems that the system is taking a bit to process the information – the acquisition announcement only went live yesterday at 10 am.
You will be ready when it happens! 🙂
sorry, just read the other UK posts saying the same. I’ll check and keep my eyes open x
awesome! but does the UK contract require putting the U in color and flavor, having tea instead of coffee, using the word ‘whilst’, and having ppl on horses and carriages riding on the left hand side? inquiring minds want to know lol. I was shocked to find out with Harry Potter that the UK version was different, that they edited the US version so for example ‘bogey’ became ‘ booger’s lol.
No, the UK edition will not have British spelling and the title will remain unchanged 🙂
Yessssss UK visit ! Sailing on the ship of HA to UK waters ! The British horde is fluffy and very chalant , I promise .
Umm, I no know this “chalant” of which you speak.
Cool! Hadn’t thought about it, but it makes sense. And congratulations HA!
hey, this has probably been answered in the thread but I’m sneaking this message in while at work so couldn’t check out…. Will this impact e-book ordered on amazon.co.uk? as my preorder still seems to be live for my ebook.
if tor has a different ebook system in happy to cancel and order through them directly:)
It impacts all formats. The change hasn’t yet gone through the system 🙂
thank you Mod R 🙂
We normally only get our own publications of extremely well known US authors here in the UK (think Stephen King) and to save space I usually only get the ebooks. However, in celebration of HA’s first UK publication and the fact I’m getting my eyes done (so should be able to read actual books again), when it’s published, I will take myself off to the Grimsby branch of Waterstones and purchase Maggie in person…Wheee!!!!
Kate Daniels also had a U.K. edition 🙂
Waterstones does fancy versions of hardcover books. Is someone in the US going to be doing the same?
The US version of This Kingdom has sprayed edges 🙂
If you make it to the UK I will spontaneously combust from excitement! Yay on Tor UK!
Sadly I had to cancel my Amazon pre-order because Amazon has made it impossible to install books on any reader other than Amazon. Even DRM free books aren’t DRM free.
Fortunately for us, there are non-Amazon retailers for This Kingdom both in the US and internationally 🙂
oh this might answer my question re other ebook sellers, will the ebook be available from other sellers with different ebook settings, so if you happen to want to read the book on a kindle (just because of reading esperance) or later on a nook etc. we would be able to?
House Andrews is absolutely, positively, without a doubt, Le-gen-wait for it-dary!
I can’t wait! And congratulations on the British publisher!
Erm, um… paperback?
At the moment, the physical format for both edition is hardback 🙂.
dragon books nearly always welcome here! some show up on the internet and would be, like x rated, them not so much. However every Ilona Andrews book, story, ebook we have com across have all been WONDERFUL.
thanks for the link, just ordered from amazon. is there a pre-order link for the inheritance book? xx
Not yet 🙂, The Inheritance doesn’t have an official release date at the moment, but watch this space!
Both are coming soon 🤩
Comming to the UK?!! bated breath and will definatly come to meet you if you make it here! 🙂
Great news. I managed to cancel my original order easily enough. I ordered the new one then realised the other hadn’t been cancelled. Excited for a Uk version and the possibility of an IRL sighting!
Technically, since TOR is a subsidiary of MacMillan Publishers you never left the UK.
But if it means you might come across to visit, whatever you say and welcome.
I’m not much of a commentator normally but this is SO exciting! I would love the opportunity to meet you guys in the uk as I’ve been fangirling over your books for a very very long time. Wish you guys every success and happiness!
Stop it this is so exciting! tragically it’s just as I’m leaving my home country for the long run – pretty please announce any trips to the UK as early as you know them so that I can plan to nip back for it! After years of being frustrated at the IA shaped chasm on the shelves of Waterstones I’m so so happy you’re making it in. Fingers crossed for a grand success so that more Brits get the joy of discovering your work.
“If the book does well, maybe we will finally make it over to the UK to meet all of you. Fingers crossed.”
And maybe you will get the full recognition you deserve and maybe they will recognize this will make a great movie.
Well, my preorder at Amazon Australia got canceled but there isn’t any way of ordering the ebook from it yet (or the hardback)
Waiting impatiently for them to add it
Another Australian in the same boat. Trying to be w*it p*ti3nt!y for it to become available here. Though, I’ll admit I’m a tad nervous, as there are a few series by other Author’s with UK publication rights, which are not available here.
Another Australian waiting impatiently for the Kindle edition to be available after my original order was cancelled.