Received: "The Freedom of Fantastic Things", CAS/Hippocampus Press
Posted by:
dsalley13 (IP Logged)
Date: 11 September, 2006 01:01PM
I just received (after an almost 2 year wait, because I foolishly pre-ordered it) "The Freedom of Fantastic Things" (CAS) Hippocampus Press.
Here's a complete copy of my e-mail to Hippocampus press this morning after what was left of it arrived:
Dear Mr. Hussey,
The book arrived this morning. Just as I was warned, it is bound and presented horribly. You charged me $50.00, made me and many others wait almost 2 years, and delivered in tattered and destroyed condition (as far as collector value goes) a book that should be the pinnacle of Clark Ashton Smith scholarship and collecting.
The book you sent (across the entire United States) minimally wrapped in bubble wrap, and placed in a Priority Mail paper envelope, has been beaten to death by it's travels and handling. Even the lowly Science Fiction Book Club sends their damn books in a suitable and protective box, but not you!
The incredibly "Stupid" part about this is that the USPS provides boxes for FREE! You could have ordered suitable shipping boxes from the USPS on-line and had them delivered to your packing department absolutely free of charge, thereby adding not one penny to your shipping costs! I can't believe you did this.The book is destroyed, all 4 corners are down and the heel of the spine is crushed, torn and broken. Have you never sent or received a book in a proper shipping box? Do you not know of the USPS Automated Regional Sorting Centers, that have an almost never ending array of conveyor belts that drop the package considerably as it winds it's way through the laser-scanning maze?
The real slap in the face is your use of POD (print -on-demand) style binding. For $30.00 extra (compared to your TPB of the same title) I didn't get a book that is Smythe-Sewn, or even has a GD Dust jacket!
I will be warning everyone not to buy this book in the HC state and to demand that it even a TPB version be boxed or at least padded protectively enough to travel safely through the USPS system.
Please send a TPB version and refund the $30.00 extra (plus return postage costs) I spent on this travesty. I will then properly box it and send it back just as it arrived. I will include your original mailing envelope too and you can see what external damage it took in it's journey here.
I will never trust or buy a book from your company again, it is obvious that you don't care about books or book buyers by what you have done concerning this title. What a disgrace you are to the small press publishing industry. What a sad thing to do to a highly revered and respected author, and what a dastardly way to treat your customers.
If this is what you call a Hardcover edition ("Collector's Edition" in any other publishers parlance), you really have lost touch with us collectors. $30.00 extra for the same book just because you had the bindery slap some hard boards on the TPB version and glue on a laminated cover. Totally incredible!!!
Sincerely and disgustedly yours,
Doris J. Salley
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If any of you have not received your copy yet, get ready for a real come-down. If this is the state of Small Press in America these days, I want no more part of it! Luckily we have quality publishers like Wildside (who should have done this book!) and Arkham House. I can't believe what Hippocampus has done. Even the paper used for the text block is cheap pulpy crap!!!!
I suggest you only buy the TPB version if you just have to have this book. The HC form is totally disgusting, even if it had been sent carefully.
dsalley13