Public service announcement:
The City of Ruin ebook is now available – hurrah! However, it’s currently got quite a few errors in it… the usual stuff: two or more words being combined, hyphens in the middle of random words, that sort of thing (any other abuses of English are entirely my own).
My overlords at Tor UK have informed me that they’re now updating the ebook to get rid of said errors. Once they have the corrected file on Kindle, readers will have to contact Customer Services and will receive the corrected file free (you’ll be asked to delete the old file at this point. Kindle don’t ‘push’ a corrected file out to all readers unless the title has been removed from sale by them. Apparently for iBooks, if you delete and re-download, the file will be updated.
The Mark Charan Newton customer services team would like to thank you for your patience.
It’s very clear to me from discussions surrounding ebook formatting, that such mistakes are not uncommon in the industry, and that it is also frustrating to readers (especially when you fork out good money, right?). While I can see it being a right pain in the arse for publishers to quickly get their entire backlist out the door, I guess at some point you’d like to stop feeling like second-class readers…
7 replies on “Ebook Update”
Glad to hear this, as it’s on my “to read” list. And, yep, I’ve seen quite a few of those kinds of errors (hyphens, word breaks, etc.) in ebooks. Only slightly annoying, but eager for days when that’s no longer the norm.
Mark,
I got a Kindle for Christmas, and have read several books littered with errors! At first, I felt quite annoyed, but its amazing how quickly you get used to them. Terrible really, I feel like I want to get my red pen out.
Good to hear your book is now on Kindle, and when I’ve got through a few more of the novels I’ve purchased, I’ll buy a copy of your book.
Hopefully, without errors.
Maria
Hi guys – yeah, I understand your pain. I never realised just how frequent ebook errors were.
I really think it’s worthwhile letting publishers know where the errors are. I mean, until I saw someone mention City of Ruin on Amazon (and then another chap mentioned it on Twitter), I didn’t know about it. Power to the people, n’all that!
I’m not an ebook reader, but wanted to ask out of curiousity regarding the whole publication process: Why is City of Ruin’s ebook publication date is such a long time after the initial book was released in Hardback/Paperback?
I’ve read that re-editing and repackaging a book from its original form is an ardouous process in itself. But is it the uncertainty of financial reward (I gather the ebook market is still represents only around 1% of the total book market) and expense of the task that lengthens this, or is it a matter or priority… or what exactly?
All the best,
Jo
Jo – I’m not actually sure. It should have gone live at the same time as the book was released, to be fair; though I could have checked on that myself…
I wouldn’t know on the second point. It differs, I would say, from publisher to publisher. Margins are tight, costs need to be kept low…
Mark – what is the best way for readers to contact the publisher with e-book typos and formatting errors? Will they listen to us readers and fix them, or only if it comes from the author? Thanks!
Well, most publisher websites have a contact form, but it’s probably best to send a list of errors and examples, perhaps, to both the author and publisher. (The author will most definitely want it sorting quickly!)