Carol Moncado

You get the email.

“Your boxes have shipped.”

And you know that in those boxes are copies of your own books. You’ve been working feverishly to get the books out quickly and this is the first time you’ve ordered books for giveaways and friends who wanted personalized copies and gifts for loved ones. You’ve decided, months earlier, that indie publishing is right for you, so you’ve poured your blood, sweat, and tears into not only the words, but the editing, the cover design, the formatting.

Then the day comes.

And you bemoan the fact that your part of your neighborhood is near the end of the UPS’s man’s route. It says the packages will be there between 3-7pm, but you know it’ll be at least 430, and probably after 5 before they show up.

Then there’s the rumbling of a truck outside and your dog starts to bark. A banging on the door and you open it. There, in all their glory are three boxes of books.

You bring them inside. Rip them open.Spread them around and weep happy tears at the culmination of all your hard work. You flip through them , savoring your name in print. Skimming the words you agonized over weeks or months (or even years) earlier.

Satisfaction settles around you like a cloak. A job well done.

Yeah. Notsomuch. 😉

My three boxes of books got here yesterday. For a variety of reasons, I’d left before the UPS man showed up. My sister, my 13-year-old daughter and I were going shopping for some of the last Christmas stuff. We’d gone to our Walmart to return some stuff for my sister and pick up some medicine. We decided to go to Arby’s for dinner so we ran back by the house to get some coupons after the UPS man had been by. They looked for coupons in my husband’s car (college campus coupons – benefits of teaching at a college ;)). I ran inside. snapped a quick pic of the three boxes stacked there, ripped each one open, took a quick pic of the inside, grabbed a copy of each, and was back in the car in less than four minutes.

Then came the stop at Arby’s, Target, PetsMart, another Walmart, Michaels, GameStop/Barnes & Noble (my daughter and I went to GameStop while my sister returned some stuff to the BN across the parking lot then she met us), two more WalMarts (returned some stuff to the last one that I’d bought earlier but no longer needed), then my WalMart again and home a little before midnight.

 

(I did post a picture on Facebook – in several places which was great fun!)

I didn’t have a chance to look through the three copies I’d grabbed so I was sitting on the couch, whimpering over my aching feet, a few minutes after midnight, and I started to flip through the copies. A friend instant messaged me a grammar question. I responded to her as I flipped through the first two. Told her I was headed to bed. Flipped through the last copy and…

Seriously debated crying.

A lot.

On the outside, it was Finally Mr. Write.

On the inside it was Finding Mr. Write.

The wrong book.

I instant messaged the friend. She freaked out with me. Fifteen books. No good. I logged into my account on CreateSpace and opened the previewer. I must have uploaded the wrong file :(.

But no. There it was. The right words in the right place.

Relief that it wasn’t my fault flooded through me. I’ve heard good things about CreateSpace fixing screw ups so that was good. Quickly, I checked the other fourteen copies. They were all just fine.

Thank God.

I have Christmas with my husband’s family today so I won’t get to call until later. Now that it’s all okay, he thinks it’s amusing and that I should keep the book for fun. I will.