British readers lost in translations as foreign literature sales boom

Popular Scandinavian authors including Jo Nesbø and Stieg Larsson drive growing domestic demand for translated books

British readers are devouring foreign fiction in record numbers amid a mini-boom in translated novels, inspired by the success of Scandinavian authors such as Jo Nesbø.

Among a string of high-profile launches, Penguin Classics is soon to publish a collection of Arabic short stories, entitled Tales of the Marvellous and News of the Strange, translated by the Cambridge academic Malcolm Lyons. It is the first time in 1,000 years that the earliest-known Arabic stories will have been printed in English.

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