I am not the sort to admit to being in the wrong. It is is trait I dislike immensely but sometimes there comes a time when you have to bow to the inevitable and accept that others are correct and you have been blind for far too long. It happened occasionally while working and has occurred again recently. It began with a statement and ended in an augment. The sorry fact is Dead Men Lie has issues.
Our book which so many have bought and read and commented upon as being a great read is littered with errors. Why has this happened? The simple answer is human error, a little vanity perhaps and not understanding the publishing industry sufficiently. We have been told the format is wrong, the text is in the wrong font, the front cover is boring and needs jazzing up, the size is incorrect and the text still contains errors. Is it that bad?
The simple reason for this is that Dead Men Lie has gone through numerous rewrite's and edits and in that process we have become word blind and confused, our eyes have seen what we expect to see and our brain's have turned to mush. The last is case in point where the wrong edition went to print and only now have we realised our mistake.
What can be done? The process has already started Dead Men Lie is back with the editing staff, they are dissecting each line each paragraph each sentence, removing the repetitions, deleting the spelling mistakes (council and counsel is down to me) and once again tightening up the story. For my part the formatting is complete, the book size has altered and other factors brought to our attention completed (is anyone else aware that in America the page number goes to the top of the page while in England we like them to be central and at the bottom of the page.) Small points but evidently such things show your amateur status. Personally I have never looked at a book that closely so long as I enjoy the story that is all that concerns me.
Dead Men Lie then is back in the repair shop being fine tuned, it will return around November ready to be tested on the race track of life. How will we present it to you the readers? That is a question that gave me a disturbed nights sleep. Those that know me realise I detest free giveaways. I think they detract from our business commitments, while allowing huge numbers of our books to be read freely. However, as a means of redemption for our lack of professionalism Dead Men Lie will, for a limited time, be made available via Amazon Kindle free of charge. For those who bought Dead Men Lie previously this will allow you to read again a more polished version. For those who bought a hard copy I will be making other arrangements for you nearer the time.
I believe no other author has offered this sort of apology, it will cost me money but that is a small price to pay if you my loyal readers achieve a book that is as good as we can make it. So please follow our progress here and on our website davidtprocterbooks.co.uk. I promise if you were disappointed before the new version will blow you away. We might even add a new twist somewhere.
Until later thank you for your patience
Dave
11.09.13
Morning all
this appears to have struck a chord for which i thank all those who took the time to reply. I must say it would appear the consensus here and on the website is one of astonishment that we have taken this line of approach. Look at it as if Dead Men Lie were a car involved in minor dent it is back in the body shop for a few dents to be removed and a bit of a respray.
What is surprising is that some of my facebook friends have totally ignored what i said surprisingly most come from what we must call the recognised publishing industry. is this because they don;t care or have no control over their work once its in print.
That is there problem which they should redress as for Dead Men Lie we progress well and will keep you all informed as to progress and re launch date perhaps we should have some sort of on line launch party who knows how to arrange that, i will bring the nibbles.
Until our next encounter
Dave
11.09.13
Morning all
this appears to have struck a chord for which i thank all those who took the time to reply. I must say it would appear the consensus here and on the website is one of astonishment that we have taken this line of approach. Look at it as if Dead Men Lie were a car involved in minor dent it is back in the body shop for a few dents to be removed and a bit of a respray.
What is surprising is that some of my facebook friends have totally ignored what i said surprisingly most come from what we must call the recognised publishing industry. is this because they don;t care or have no control over their work once its in print.
That is there problem which they should redress as for Dead Men Lie we progress well and will keep you all informed as to progress and re launch date perhaps we should have some sort of on line launch party who knows how to arrange that, i will bring the nibbles.
Until our next encounter
Dave
Thank you. I accept your apology and I am grateful to have an author on my shelf who cares about their work.
ReplyDeleteEven this cannot be said for some major authors who allow the editing errors and publishing errors to pile up until the book is unreadable.