Whooops! Wrong CONNECT

This is a funny story… although it probably wasn’t too funny for the person that hit the wrong key on the keyboard, resulting in thousands of newly printed books being pulled. Whooops!

Most of you know that my brand new book CONNECT is due on the shelves in January, but I’m supposed to get copies this month (hundreds of you have already pre-ordered those copies and already received the free ppt training we’re giving away to anyone who buys the book from us).

For weeks now, the question has been… when this month? For those with a short attention span- the answer is- probably around Christmas. You’ll just never guess as to why…

I never tell people the exact release dates in case of a mess-up. We just have been telling people a nice broad DECEMBER. Well… let me let you in on a huge whoops that is being corrected as we speak.

My publisher was actually going to get those books to me the day before Thanksgiving. I was thrilled, because then I would have been shipping them to you all and you probably would have had them in your hands right now! But, when the books were finished being printed, Fed-ex couldn’t deliver the 1,000-plus books I ordered before Thanksgiving, so we scheduled the delivery for the Monday after Thanksgiving. Meanwhile, my publisher overnighted one copy- hot off the press- and I received that two days before Thanksgiving.

On Thanksgiving day I’m hanging out with my family and my dad is thumbing through the book (the book that my publisher has already printed thousands of). My dad asks me, “What is this weird punctuation I keep seeing in the indented sections?”

Now, let me put this in perspective. I have proofed this book probably four times in the last three months. My publisher has editors, those editors even have proofers, then they send it to me for my two cents… then I send it back to them if I have any changes, etc. etc. The thing gets read and tweaked about 20 times in the last few months. When I got the copy off the press, I browsed through it quickly, but I didn’t look in detail. My dad, however, was reading through an entire chapter.

Apparently someone hit the wrong button when the final draft got sent to the printer. I don’t know how it happened… but every indented section in the book (every quote, every indented example, etc.) was somehow coded wrong and has some bizarre punctuation that makes it look like Spanish punctuation or something. Take a peek at this pic I snapped of one of the indented sections:

Those errors are throughout the whole book on that initial printing.

So on Thanksgiving day I’m emailing my publisher, “I’ve got some REALLY bad news.”

Long story short, thousands of books were recalled, and now they are being reprinted (within the next week, I think). We’ve all been waiting for a new date. Just today, they have told me that I will see the new “error free” copies, early in the week of Christmas.

So those of you who pre-order, you will still get them from me before you get them from anywhere else (because they are rushing me the first copies). And, those that order from our web site will not only get them first, they will also get the free ppt training we are giving away to anyone who purchases from us.

So what’s the date? If I am shipping them the week of Christmas… those who choose PRIORITY MAIL will get them just a few days later, but those who choose the cheap media mail won’t get them till closer to New Years.

Nice.

In defense of my publisher Zondervan… they’ve never made a mistake like this before with me, and they have been amazing through this process. They have promised to rush me my pre-order copies and are making every effort to help. Much thanks to all of them at Z!

And thanks to all of you who are being patient as well. I know, I know… we’ve said December all along. But usually I wouldn’t have pushed it this close to January. So thanks for your patience!