Wow…I’m Blown Away…

08 September 2006 by The General Published in: Civil War books and authors 8 comments

This afternoon, JD and I got an e-mail from Ted Savas letting us know that the first printing of our book is completely sold out, one week after the books shipped from the printer. What’s more is that Ted told me that he has a very substantial lot of backorders pending, too. He’s going to be ordering a second printing of the book next week.

JD and I both had a pretty good idea that this book was going to sell well, but it’s done better than either of us could possibly have hoped.

There will be a difference between the first printing and all subsequent ones. For some reason, the same photograph of Alfred Pleasonton appears twice in the first printing. Somehow, it slipped by all of us until I noticed it the other night flipping pages. The second printing and any subsequent printings will have a different image where the Pleasonton photo appears the second time. All of us were amazed that it got by Ted, J.D., me, and Lee Merideth, the indexer. It just goes to show you that things sometimes get through, no matter how hard we try to catch everything.

I’m just blown away by the reaction that this book is receiving and with how well it’s doing. Thank you to each and every one of you who has made this happen.

Scridb filter

Comments

Brian S.

Sat 09th Sep 2006 at 2:20 am
Eric,

That explains my week. I tried to pre-order through amazon but their website was at first saying the book was available Sept. 10, then it was changed to Sept. 1. When I tried to pre-order on Wednesday it then said the book would be ready to ship on November 6! So THEN I went to Barnes & Noble and they said they weren’t getting the book until Sept. 28/ Oct. 1. I finally went to your book’s website and saw that I could order it through there so that’s where I purchased it. And that’s my quest to get a copy :). Can you say how many books were printed in the first run? To have a non-fiction book sell out is pretty good. Brian
Theodore P. Savas

Sat 09th Sep 2006 at 2:40 am
Hi Brian

Ted Savas here, the publisher of these motley couple of wandering writers. Thanks for being so diligent. Will all our titles, you can go to http://www.savasbeatie.com and order them there if you can’t find them elsewhere. We encourage you, however, to order through the authors if you can.

We don’t release numbers, but it was an “average” print run for a Civil War hardcover title. I am usually good at knowing how many to print, but I misjudged this one.

One other note. Lots of you guys belong to Round Tables or some other historical group. We offer the best groups discount program around, and signed copies used for raffles generally raise 3-5 times the cost of the book. Details are on our website. (Say Eric, how come your RT doesn’t pick up some signed SB books and raffle them off?)

Thank you.

tps
J.D. Petruzzi

Sat 09th Sep 2006 at 9:29 am
I was quite shocked to hear from Ted that this initial run did so well. It truly humbles me to know that folks anticipate reading it, and that there’s been so much buzz around the book. Makes the years of study and writing all worth it. As Eric said, we all expected it to do decently, since this is the first time such a popular and controversial subject has been tackled in so much detail. But blowing through a print run in a week that we thought might at least last a few months makes us happy indeed.

We’ve been watching Amazon’s site and noticed the date changes and availability issues. They may very well be shipping earlier than their site says, since they have books in stock and will be receiving more. Hard to tell what’s up. A couple days ago I spoke with the manager of our local Borders store, which is setting up a book signing for me next month, and when trying to order the book online through the distributor he got a similar message – that it’s unavailable at the moment. I’m sure it’ll all get straightened out soon. In the meantime, and always, Eric and I have signed books available on our site – http://www.stuartsride.com – and that’s also the only place to purchase one of the Signed and Numbered Limited Gettysburg Editions, limited to 100 copies (http://www.stuartsride.com/Order.htm). Those are going fast (orders have been coming in every day since release) so if anyone would like to procure one of those, please order quickly so you aren’t disappointed.

Ted has been wonderful to us. He was very patient through to the end of the editing process as we fed in new material at the last moment (Eric has written here previously about that) and he has helped create a lot of buzz about the book. He’s been a world-class partner for us.

J.D.
The General

Sat 09th Sep 2006 at 9:38 am
Ted,

Our CWRT doesn’t do raffles. Simple enough. 🙂

Brian, Hopefully, you will get yours soon.

As I’ve said, I’m blown away by the whole thing.

Eric
Paul Taylor

Sun 10th Sep 2006 at 12:27 pm
Eric / J.D. / Ted:

Is the limited edition still set for a mid-Sept release date? I suspect, and hope 🙂 that it will become a desirable collector’s item!

Also, should those of us who reserved one send $$$ to Savas Beatie now?

Congratulations!
Paul
The General

Sun 10th Sep 2006 at 2:57 pm
Paul,

It is, and you can order through our web site.

Eric
Mark

Tue 12th Sep 2006 at 1:13 pm
That your and JD’s book sold out as quickly as it did speaks volumes of your work Eric! After reading several of your other works….I defiantely look forward to reading this one.

Mark
The General

Tue 12th Sep 2006 at 5:30 pm
I really appreciate that, Mark. Thank you.

Eric