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Since Roman and Mediaeval times, Malta has been temporary home to many famous literary names in history, from Cicero, Coleridge and Lord Byron to Desmond Morris, Nicholas Monsarrat and her own son, Edward de Bono of Lateral Thinking fame.
The Sixties development boom had also resulted in the settling on the Island of many paperback writers who found in the peaceful villages and towns of Malta and Gozo the ideal setting for their creativity. Many a bestseller has been written from Malta, as have film and television scripts for major European and American productions. Malta and the Muses get on well together.
The Mediterranean is an on-going inspiration as is the lethargic lifestyle on an island that seemingly wants to move ahead with the times but is still romantically and nostalgically linked to the past. Writing a bestseller in Malta could also mean having it printed and published from a Maltese base. Maltese printers and publishers have grown and spread their wings into the bigger markets of Europe and beyond.
They compete, often successfully, for top printing and publishing contracts, privileged as they are with no linguistic hurdles to overcome. In fact books printed and published from Malta have been in English, Italian, French, Arabic, Spanish, Russian and various other languages, while there is also a thriving, albeit small, local publishing scene specialising in Maltese Language publications. The blockbuster film 'Man on Fire' was based on the novel by AJ Quinnel, written in Gozo.
In fact, the book itself featured a large part about Malta's sister isle but this location was changed by the Hollywood powers. The book you've always been dreaming about may after all see the light of day and then hopefully become a bestseller. Let your creative juices flow in Malta.
Our advice to any budding novelists out there is to rent your own farmhouse, plug in your laptop and get cracking. There can be no better place in the world to find the peace and tranquility needed to pen a bestseller than Gozo.
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