Haste makes Waste!

Clichés, axioms, truisms--they're there because they're true. I shall demonstrate.

First, though, let's give a nod to Celebration of the Senses Day, which was the 24th. Know how I celebrate the Senses every time I write? Right! By including them in every scene that I can. We always use sight and sound, and smell and touch aren't too hard. Taste is the hardest for me to work in and it doesn't happen in every scene. But one of my edits is always done for that before publication. The more help I can give readers, the more chance they'll be there with me, right where I want them. Do you do this?

Now to the haste makes waste.

Here's the story:

I loaded all the files for my trade paperback edition of CHOKE and they looked good. But, just to be safe, I took the time and ordered the proof copies (5 is the max you can order from Createspace and I can always use them for reviewers and such). They take a few days to arrive, which seems like forever after doing digital publishing.

Lo and behold. What you see in the template document is backwards. You see page 1 on the left, but really it's on the right. So I started with a blank page. You turn it and my title page was on the left! Not good.

So I fixed the file. Yeah, I fixed it. I deleted the last blank page and added one at the front. Then, because I knew it was right, I published it and ordered 10 copies.

OMG! When they arrived, I could see that the header and page number started on the very first BLANK (blankety-blank) page! Chapter One started on page 7. By deleting that last blank page, I deleted a section break, if you're into these things. Grrrr. I could also see that people were buying this copy! I cried. 

Then I took it out of circulation as soon as I could and fixed it. I also found that I had added an extra space in the dang header and the book was much longer than it needed to be. With less pages now, I can lower the price.

I'm waiting to hear from anyone who bought the early copy. If I do, I'll try to make it right. But they should stop and consider what a collector's item this is! It's like a mistake on a coin by the US Mint, right? It should be worth millions in a few years.

Yeah, right.