A debut YA novel that defies categorization created such a stir that 13 foreign publishers bought the rights before this year's Bologna Book Fair. Does Twilight belong in the horror genre? Is it a romance? Here's how publishers around the globe addressed these questions.

Partly a vampire story, but mostly a love story, the debut YA novel Twilight by Stephenie Meyer (Little, Brown/Tingley, Oct.) has been snapped up by more than a dozen countries. In the book, 17-year-old narrator Bella, new to Forks, Wash., feels magnetically drawn to an outsider who behaves erratically toward her—Edward Cullen (Bella describes him as a "bizarre, beautiful boy who may or may not despise me"). She learns that Edward is a vampire, and the danger inherent in their love becomes a metaphor for the sexual tension between them.

Just as the title's classification has stumped some U.S. booksellers who weren't sure where to place it (Barnes & Noble has it in its horror endcap; Borders may place it in adult romance when it goes into paperback), foreign publishers, too, had to figure out the right way to present the book to the widest possible audience.

First off, the word "twilight" is not a word that translates easily into other languages. Only Denmark (with the title Tusmørke) and the Czech Republic (where it will be called the equivalent of "Darkening") will use titles with a similar meaning. In Finland, where the international bidding frenzy began, the book will be called the equivalent of "Temptation." Although France has a word for "twilight," the French translation does not have the same double entendre ("both a time of day as well as 'being in the twilight of one's life,' which, in a sense Bella is," explains Megan Tingley, who edited the book), so the French publisher plans to call it "Fascination."

Here in the States, Tingley and her colleagues in LB's design department went through several iterations of cover ideas, ultimately deciding to visually play down the vampire theme in favor of a more symbolic, literary cover for American teens. But for other publishers across the Atlantic and Pacific, the vampire hook is the strongest. The Spanish publisher, for instance, told Tingley, "I love your cover, and I'd love to frame that as a beautiful piece of art. But for our audience, [the cover] has to have blood on it. It has to be obvious."

The U.S.: With its connotations of Adam and Eve, the cover uses only the pale feminine arms in a V shape to suggest its undercurrents of vampirism.
The U.K.: "They set it in school with lockers, which is kind of interesting," Tingley said. "[Bella] looks sexy andmodern, which is not how I think {she is} portrayed in the book, though the coloring is right. But I like it, I'm drawn to it. I do think it's provocative."

Denmark: "Denmark is breaking it into two books because it was too long. I think they did this with Harry Potter also," Tingley explained that they do this so that book clubs can fit the books through people's mail slots.
Japan: "In Japan, they're going to make it into three volumes, illustrated by a manga artist," said Tingley. "The first one is called The Boy Whom I Love Is a Vampire, the second is Blood Tastes Sadness and the third The Vampire Family in the Darkness."
Germany: The title will be Biss zum Morgengrauen. The publisher told Tingley, "If one ignores the second 's'in 'Biss,' the title translates into 'Until Dawn,' but by spelling 'Biss' with a double 's,' it translates into 'Bite.' "