At last! I am thrilled to have in my hands a copy of the newest edition of Mary Stewart’s children’s book The Little Broomstick. I pre-ordered this book in *July 2017!* but then the book’s release date was put back from October to 5 April 2018, presumably in line with changing cinema release dates. Those lovely people at Hive must have sent out my copy as soon as it arrived for me to receive my copy a few days early. Here it is:
Isn’t it gorgeous? Inside, each chapter heading includes an illustration by Shirley Hughes, just as the 1971 and 2001 editions do. This is the standard UK edition, that is it includes original characters and so on that were pruned from the first and, so far as I know, subsequent US editions. As with the other UK editions, the book ends with ‘A Message from the Author’ about the Helibroom (available from Harrods from £874.75…) – I wonder if any children will take this at face value and request a Helibroom for birthday or Christmas?
Finally, this new edition of the book contains a full-page grayscale promotion for the animated film Mary and the Witch’s Flower, ‘in cinemas 2018’. I am really excited about this – please let’s all buy the book and see the film, in recognition of Mary Stewart’s story-telling awesomeness! And perhaps a great response to the new book issue and film may persuade Hodder/Hachette to publish Mary Stewart’s first ever story, her never-(yet)-published children’s novel The Enchanted Journey. Here’s hoping!
I have tickets to one of the UK preview screenings of the film on 10 April, this will be in Japanese with subtitles, and I am going to this with my husband – I think I’ll wait until May for the dubbed version, with the voices of Kate Winslet and Jim Broadbent, to watch this with children. Are you planning to buy the book or see the film? I’d love to hear from you.
Mary Queen of Plots 
I have the book on order from Book Depository (which is usually the easiest and least expensive way for folks in the US to purchase UK published books, not officially for sale in the US). I am looking forward to getting my copy and comparing the text with the US text.
I also have a copy of the movie on pre-order. Scheduled to arrive sometime in early May. Unfortunately, wasn’t able to see it in theaters. At least, unlike movies like Swallows and Amazons, the US doesn’t have to wait over a year after the UK DVD release date to get copies for those of us whose DVD/BluRay players only handle Region 1 disks.
Here I was hoping that success with The Little Broomstick would lead to reissues of Walk in Wolf Wood and Ludo and the Star Horse. Somehow, even exploring your web site, I had missed the existence of a written but previously unpublished Mary Stewart children’s book. I would LOVE to have a chance to read The Enchanted Journey.
LikeLiked by 3 people
Hi Jerri, I hope your copy arrives soon! I remember you saying that you weren’t able to see the film nearby but at least you can watch the dvd fairly soon now. Like you, I’d love to see Ludo and the Wolf Wood books reissued – and I’m glad you now know about The Enchanted Journey: perhaps we should start a petition or crowdfunding to have it published! ☺
LikeLiked by 2 people
I’m in the USA so I wrote a brief opinion of this earlier. My William Morrow US edition was published in 1972. It’s the center one in the photo of 3 editions. I feel cheated now that you’ve said it was “pruned” of some original characters. Why did they do that?
LikeLiked by 2 people
Hi, it was kind of you to share your thoughts on Witch’s Flower before. Sorry you feel cheated – I have blogged about this before somewhere: among Mary Stewart’s papers at the National Library of Scotland there is a US galley and correspondence between her and her US publishers. She accepts some amendments re changes to American English but tries to retain eg Mrs Macleod the cook, discusses how she doesn’t want to write down to children etc. So UK version is the one Mary Stewart preferred.
I think kindle ebooks in US use English editions? – perhaps this is the way to read the full version of the book?
LikeLiked by 2 people
US editors can’t seem to keep from modifying English stories for the US market. The Harry Potter books (at least the early ones) were a recent high profile example. Philosopher’s Stone! The number of differences between the US and UK editions for the first several books is extensive.
The romantic suspense Mary Stewart novels released by Amazon US do seem to have the UK text rather than the text used in the US print versions for many years, at least in the two books that I know about differences (Ivy Tree and Gabriel Hounds). But the Mary Stewart’s children’s books are not currently available in Kindle format in the US.
As for the Merlin books, Amazon had them in Kindle format for a time, several month’s at least, then shortly before the romantic suspense were released in Kindle format the Merlin books had their Kindle formats removed. So glad I purchased them while I could.
(As far as I know, the Prince and the Pilgrim and The Wicked Day were not released in Kindle in the US.)
Obviously some legal rights dispute ongoing.
And don’t get me started on the availability of the audiobooks!!!
LikeLiked by 3 people
Hi Jerri, thanks, this is really intetesting to know. Do you know whether The Little Broomstick at least is going to be available as an ebook in the US soon?
As for audio books of MS, I’m not sure I could bear to listen if the narrator didn’t have The Perfect Voice for it – whatever that might sound like!
LikeLiked by 1 person
The new edition sounds fabulous! I’ll keep a look out for it! Look forwards to hearing what you think of the film when you’ve seen it, especially the differences in atmosphere/tone between the Japanese & dubbed soundtracks. 🙂
LikeLiked by 2 people
Hi Rosetta, thanks for your comment – I will definitely blog about the film versions!
LikeLiked by 2 people
Allison, thanks for letting us know the news. It’s great to see a new edition of a Mary Stewart book! Like Rosetta, I’m looking forward to hearing what you think about the film.
I’m curious about “The Enchanted Journey”—I’d love to see that one published too. In the interview with Mary Stewart on YouTube, she mentions a children’s book that was rejected (hard to imagine rejecting a Mary Stewart manuscript) because it was deemed too “scary for children.” Is “The Enchanted Journey” the story she meant? It would be fascinating to read her first story.
Thank you for another wonderful blog!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Hi Linda, Thank you for your lovely comment! You are quite right, the rejected manuscript is The Enchanted Journey. If you look at the newspaper list in the sidebar, it is mentioned in the Alison Flood article. And I wrote about it in a Top Ten Tuesday article in May 2017. I *so* want to read it!
LikeLike