Well that sucks…

Pages in the wrong place

After despatching about 150 pre-orders from the new print run, I discovered a printing error that affects a significant proportion of the books in that run.

Four pages are in the wrong place due to a problem in the binding process. Pages 138-141 are bound in just after page 121.

Obviously this is hugely frustrating as, otherwise, the book is perfect. The new image wrap cover is beautiful and far more robust than the previous jacket. All the typos have been fixed, and a few layout changes improved the flow. The whole thing looks and feels superb.

Second edition image wrap cover looks great

The right thing to do in this situation is to replace all the faulty ones that were sent out. As I don’t know which were good and which weren’t, I’m sending replacements to everyone as soon as I receive the reprinted copies.

I’ve emailed everyone to let them know, and some customers have been kind enough to decline a replacement and have asked me to sell their replacement copy to raise more money for the Skye Mountain Rescue Team.

My printing company has done the right thing as well - they are reprinting the whole batch for me at no cost, and will handle the packing and postage of the replacements as well.

The obvious lesson is to improve quality control (the printer’s and mine!) and to check every box. I guess this is a good learning exercise in my authoring/publishing journey.

While I wait for the new perfect print run to arrive, I’ll sell the faulty copies at a big discount and the money from that will go to the Skye Mountain Rescue Team so we can keep the money moving in their direction.