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

OK i do work for Hippocampus press - how ever I have received everything ever published by them sent across the oceans, and never have had anything worse than the odd bump. It seems clear that it's the postal service in your case at fault not Hippocampus Press.

I have received books from the states packed in boxes and bubble wrapped, completely destroyed by the us postal service, who had to re-wrap everything.


I haven't seen the hard back of this title, but I have found the hardbacks of the other Hippocampus press books excellent.

I understand your desire to rant, we all have had those sorts of experiences, but I just wanted to say its not typical of Hippocampus press.

dsalley13 Wrote:

[snip]

> 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 suppose you haven't seen Wildside's dust-jacket-less cardboard-bound reprint of Joshi's HPL Bibliography priced at $49.95, or their likewise dust-jacket-less cardboard-bound edition of Scott Connors's fine A CENTURY LESS A DREAM at $49.95, or their cardboard-bound edition of Lovecraft's letters to Leiber, which I believe also came to $49.95. Based on these, I wouldn't call Wildside a quality publisher.

This is obviously an exception to the rule; all the other hc Hippocampus books I've got (and I've got them all) are beautifully bound and of excellent quality, and were delivered in sterling shape. Based on my personal experience, I'd choose Hippocampus over Wildside any day.

Yrs
Martin

Doris,
I haven't seen the hardcover edition of FFT yet myself, but have seen the trade paperback. The hc edition is offered as an option for libraries; as a POD publisher there is little value to the book as a collector's item per se. The book is meant to be read and used, and will probably be in print as long as Derrick feels like keeping it in print.
I wanted to do the book with Derrick. He has done great jobs on all of the other titles he has published, including the hc editions of the Lovecraft collected essays.
I would really wish that you would judge the book by its contents and not by its ability (or lack of same) to withstand the tender mercies of the USPS. Also, was the book shipped by HP itself or was it mailed by the POD printer? Many POD books are mailed out directly by the printer; since they lack the intimacy that comes of actual contact with the end user, they can have a somewhat cavalier attitude towards taking care of them that leads to just this sort of friction.
Best,
Scott

Scott,

Of course it's the USPS's fault, but any intelligent shipper knows what they can do in advance and will send a book ready to meet the challenge (especially the challenge of the newly instituted USPS Automated Regional Sorting Centers and the endless drops from conveyor belt to conveyor belt as they are scanned and sorted).

It's not rocket-science to safely ship a book, all it takes is a little forethought, a good box and some crumpled newsprint to pad the corners and spine ends from the impact damage they will most decidely encounter. What is so damned hard about that( or expensive)?

The packages states that it was shipped by Hippocampus. If I sent you an ill-packaged book, would you fault me or the USPS???


dsalley13

Martinus,

No, I haven't seen those books from Wildside that you mention, as I have very little serious interest in the works of HPL. I have all his stories and poems from 2 publishers that make a decent HC book and I am more thna happy with them. I have all the Wildside CAS and the REH limited editon books (all well under $50.00) and have found them as well made as NESFA books, i.e. well bound, good paper, and no excuses.

I have some of the Wildside regular POD editions of REH's work and a plethora of their other pulp author titles too. The worst of the lot (and one of the first REH titles Wildside published) was "Graveyard Rats". The paper is thin and the printing has to have been done by the dot-matrix method. It's so bad it is mostly unreadable. But, Wildside has progressed and all the books I have purchased ltd's or not, seem to have a great overall improvement. Doing things better seems to be the name of the game, not regressing into poor quality like is obviated by the new Hippocampus CAS title.

dsalley13

Scott,

Well, according to your explanation, Hippocampus seems to need to put in a disclaimer:

"Sorry for the totally lacking quality of this title in HC form. We are making the HC available only because libraries will want them and didn't expect any collectors to buy the wonderful works contained within with any great hope of permanance or regular HC quality. Please don't order this book if you are expecting a quality HC and also disregard that we are pricing as if it were so."

If they did that, I wouldn't have ordered it almost 2 years ago!

Pretty sad when you think of it, the best book ever produced with extremely good and wonderfully current CAS lit-crit and the HC version is a turkey! I scanned the contents and it is a wonderful book. Too bad it wasn't treated as such in the $30.00 extra Libraries, not Collectors edition.

As to shipping, I mis-replied to you when I meant Boyd. As to your inquiry, the package says Hippocampus Press was the shipper and has their street address on it. Hippocampus' method might work pretty well for across town or state to nearby state, but travelling the 3.000 miles to get to me, has found that method greatly lacking.



dsalley13

Speaking from my own experience, I've ordered the book of Barlow's poems, CAS's poems, and Loveman's poems from Hippocampus, and had no problems with them. I did have a problem with my pre-order of HPL's letters to Galpin, which was lost in the mail. I contacted Hippocampus, and they were kind enough to dispatch a second copy, free of charge.

The worst job of packing I ever experienced was for a TPB copy of Jules Laforgue's poems ordered from Amazon.com. They sent it in a box with no plastic wrapping, and of course it arrived soaked through by rain. Amazingly, I was able to dry it out and it looks just fine now.

You're right that the sender should have availed himself or herself of one of the cardboard boxes the USPS so plentifully provies. But this is life: things often go wrong for collectors! If collector's items weren't destroyed occassionally, then the surviving items wouldn't be collectible.

I have a hard time relating to the anger in this post as it is the contents of the book I'm most interested in rather than the look of the book itself! I can say that I have the TPB of this title and that I'm enjoying working my way through it. The binding seems strong and the type is highly readable. That's what matters to me.

I have the hardcover editions of the Hippocampus Collected Essays of HPL, and was very pleased with the look and durability of those.

Hippocampus is a small press that has published (and will continue to publish) some wonderful books that might not easily find a home elsewhere. I think the vast majority of you will be more than pleased with their production of The Freedom of Fantastic Things.

Roger Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I have a hard time relating to the anger in this
> post as it is the contents of the book I'm most
> interested in rather than the look of the book
> itself!

Because this was not really the point. Doris didn't comment on the contents, but on the fact that in her opinion the binding and general aspect of the book was not was she expected. Of course the contents is what matters most, but again this is not really the point here. This is being discussed on Gavin's yahoo group.

Phil

Wouldn't this sort of thing be best handled one-on-one with the publisher?

The letter is written in such a passionate (i.e. crackpot) manner that were it sent to me, I would at first read it in amazement, then perhaps show it to a few friends for amusement's sake, and finally hope that no further communications with this person were to follow!

And with that, lets return to our regular program.