Honesty, honestly?

I ordered the second printing of 100 books. I thought my graphics person and I communicated clearly, but I didn’t double check. And, indeed, the second printing had a different flaw than the first run. There are two pages in the wrong order, resulting in a full spread of two blank ones. Not what I intended.

What to do? One choice is to use these as is and hope nobody notices. But to me, it feels like there’s a huge neon flashing light saying “Didn’t you notice – you screwed up here!” Next option–put these books in the back corner of my closet and order another batch that we get right. No problem, … except for time and money. So I figured out a third way. There’s almost always a third way.

In each book, I am putting a small sticker that says, “These pages left blank by accident. (I’m new at self-publishing.) Please use to doodle or take notes.”

We’ve all seen pages that say “this page left blank intentionally.” So why not confess that I did not intend for these pages to be blank, and I don’t want to waste my money and time because of a small flaw.

The third try’s the charm, right? Keep ordering books so I can justify a third printing and all will be well. We live and learn.