Stupidest Indie Publishing Mistake
of 2024 Award goes to... moi
of 2024 Award goes to... moi
Blazing Reader,
Back in November, I won the Stupidest Indie Publishing Mistake of 2024 Award when I accidentally deleted two-thirds of the master copy of All the Humans Are Sleeping.
How did I pull off such a blunder?
I blame a little of it on sleep deprivation. As the date for the book launch approached, I wasn't getting enough rapid eye movements. Sort of ironic, considering the title of the novel.
Disaster arose when I was preparing the preview copy. This is where I give away the first 24 chapters. I figure it's such a great story that once you start reading you'll have no choice but to purchase a copy to satiate your curiosity.
To make the free preview version, I duplicated the master copy and then cut the final 50 chapters or so.
Except, it seems, I didn't make a duplicate of the master copy. Instead, I duplicated it after I cut the chapters.
No problem, I thought. I run two backup systems 24/7.
First, I went to my external "time machine" hard drive, which is supposed to store multiple versions of every file I've saved for the last few weeks. Oddly, though, it didn't work. It only had the amputee version.
Then I checked my $120/year, offsite, third-party backup service, Carbonite, which should have preserved an older version of the file. Strangely, it failed me too.
I suddenly felt like I had eaten those 200 deceased pages and they were bunched up in a tight ball in the centre of my gut.
Now, of course, I still had the "compiled" version of the novel in PDF format, which is what Amazon sells. But I can't edit, update or modify this file.
I already had a new testimonial to add to the front matter, needed to fix the title page and knew, inevitably, some reader was going to report a lingering typo I'd need to eradicate. I could do none of these things with the compiled version.
So, what did I do? I'll save that painful story for tomorrow.
In the meantime, keeping in mind how much grief the preview version of my novel has cost me, please share it with your friends and families. They can get the first 24 chapters for free in both ebook and audiobook formats. Tell them to go to...
...click on "SNEAK PREVIEW" and, as Seán ÓLaoire, PhD says, "Curl up and prepare to be both shocked and delighted at the same time.”
—John C.A. Manley
John C. A. Manley is the author of Much Ado About Corona, All The Humans Are Sleeping and other works of philosophical fiction that are "so completely engaging that you find yourself alternately laughing, gasping, hanging on for dear life." Get free samples of his stories by becoming a Blazing Pine Cone email subscriber.
