I Stuffed Up

Me and dates, we don’t get along. Not dates as in the fruit. They’re alright. And prunes, I’m a fan of prunes. Dried apricots, sultanas, raisins, currants, yeah, they’re all good. But that’s not what I’m on about.

I’m talking about dates, mate. Dates. As in, the day of the month of the year. Dates. It’s a bit of a running joke, see, that I get muddled when it comes to dates. If you say, “Hey, be there on the 14th”, my brain promptly forgets that whole sentence and starts wondering if the Macarina and macaroni have any relation.

To give you an example, on at least two occasions, I have requested leave from work, locked it in, put it in the calendar, only to turn up at work on that day clueless. One day runs into the next and, next thing I know, I’ve missed a birthday or an anniversary or an important event.

This works in the other direction, as well. Like, for example, setting the bloody date for a book to be published. You see, I had Tedrick’s Audiobook on the go at the same time as having Iris of the Shadows about to be launched. Prolly a silly idea, in hindsight, but that’s how it was. So:

1. Tedrick was supposed to be published on July 1st.
2. Iris was supposed to be published on June 21st

Sound simple enough? It was supposed to be. Iris goes out a week or so before Tedrick, too easy, lock it in. Only… only Jez, in his unique way, managed to set the release for Iris to be the 21st of July, not June.

So, picture this. There’s me, on the 21st of JUNE, all ready to rock and roll with the big announcement of “Iris of the Shadows is Released!” and… and… wait, what did I do. Face + Palm. Cue mad scramble to Draft2Digital, Smashwords, Google and Amazon to fix it all up. Well, try and fix it up.

Nope. Too little, too late. In terms of distribution, Kobo and iTunes and Barnes & Noble still have it set for July 21st. Google will allow it out on the 23rd, Amazon on the 25th, Smashwords on the 24th and… yeah.

I stuffed up.

Sad to say, but thems the facts and the facts can’t be changed because otherwise they wouldn’t be facts, now, would they? Alrighty, what does that all mean? Well, you can get Iris of the Shadows in hardcopy and ebook right now from Amazon, Google and Smashwords, but you’ll need to wait up to a month for Kobo and Barnes and Noble. I guess it’s a bit of a soft-launch, then, and I’ll look to doing a more formal announcement when I can confirm it’s properly up and out. I guess it has waited ten years, what’s another month, eh?

Sorry about that.