As I noted last week – Marci McDonald’s revised edition of The Armageddon Factor was released by Random House April 13, 2011. Being that it is a revised trade paperback which according to Random House is available, where is it?
How come I can’t get a copy from Chapters Indigo?
It’s a fair question I posed to a clerk from my local outlet.
(The book is available at independent booksellers)
The clerk was unaware The Armageddon Factor was out in paperback and told me that their shipping takes about 3 weeks, which is normal for this time of year. Because Chapters Indigo is a chain, the stores put the books out when everyone else in the chain gets them.
She offered that as far as she knew her employer was waiting on the publisher to ship them.
Okay. Chapters Indigo is owned by Heather Reisman (CEO). She is married to Gerry Schartwz who is the Board Chair, President and CEO of Onex. They are friends of Stephen and Laureen Harper, and have been Conservative Party backers since 2006.
Nigel Wright, the Prime Minister’s chief of staff, is on loan to Harper by the Onex Corporation. Wright’s appointment is noted in the afterword of the updated and revised trade paperback.
Given the paperback was updated and out in time for the election I have a question.
Where is it? Is the revised edition sitting in Chapters-Indigo warehouses? The chain is in approximately 131 cities across Canada and I can appreciate delays, but the next obvious question is this.
Is Chapters Indigo holding back stocking this book until after May 2nd?
As asked in the post headline. Is this bookstore chain playing politics?
BDBO readers – how would you like to help out? Give the nearest Chapters Indigo store a call and ask if the paperback is in. If it isn’t ask why not. If you have an independent bookstore in your location, give them a call and see if they have it on the shelves, or if they can get it to you within the next few days and post your findings in the comment section.
The e-book is available, since, as far as I can tell Random House released it, and online sales aren’t held up in warehouses. The paperback edition is also available from Amazon Canada. The unrevised hardcover is also available at my local store.
Unfortunately the Chapters Indigo non-fiction blog does not allow comments, so readers willing to find out if their Chapters Indigo has the revised edition on their shelf will have to leave their information in the BDBO comment section. When you use the online store finder, every location you can key in, lists the availabilty as 0. Zero. Go ahead, try it.
Given the kerfuffle with the hardcover release of The Armageddon Factor last year, the delay reaching Reisman’s bookstore shelves deserves an explanation.
If you were able to purchase a copy of the paperback from a Chapters Indigo outlet, pop into the comments and let me know eh?
These are all good comments, but I say screw Chapters. With any luck, they’ll go the way of Borders in the US.
They’ve eaten the lunch of every small book retailer and now they’re trying to get things their way with pro big business copyright rules so that they can sell books that ‘decompose digitally’ so you’ll have to keep buying them.
Who cares if they don’t have the book? Buy it somewhere else. Borrow if from someone. Borrow if from the library. It’s free there.
This should come as no surprise. If there is information in the book that would damage Harper’s already tarnished integrity then a loyal supporter would want to block it.
What is quite amusing though is the fact that Indigo/Chapters would even consider holding back this edition. The book is available elsewhere and most thinking people already know about the latest Harper scandals – they are a normal part of his party’s performance and it is just another day at the office.
The information was online as soon as the book was released – twittered, facebooked and blogged. Harperites/hard core conservatives wouldn’t believe the book or would support him anyway. The rest of us voted at the advanced polls. \;0
Mr. Wright may be out of a job after May 2. Mr. Schwartz will lose credibility and in an struggling industry that certainly isn’t a wise business move. Besides – Amazon ships quickly and most of us know enough to get a book the fastest way possible. Clearly that is not Chapters/Indigo this time.
Why do people have to wear their political party on their sleeves and try to shove it down people’s throats? Either you like Harper or you don’t. Hiding the evidence of his governments bad behaviour isn’t in the best interests of his party – the Canadian people are smarter than that. This is the kind of nonsense you would expect from right-wing evangelicals, not a political party. The Liberals/NDP/Bloc all have issues – lay them on the table and serve the people who elected you. Sheesh.
I bought the paperback of Armageddon with another book at the Chapters front desk, in order to get it as soon as Capters sent it out. (I’ve done this before–I pay for the book and they ship it to me.) When I order books from the Chapters warehouse, they come from back east, from a warehouse in Ontario. I get two or more books to get free shipping, and sometimes they come one at a time if I have bought one of the books before its official release.
Haven’t got the paperback Armageddon yet in my mail, FWIW.
It would be passing strange if one kind of new bookstores already had the book, as Bene D points out.
How about Random House? Perrhaps something like this happened. First wave of books goes out to the littler bookstores. The government falls while 70-80 per cent of the paperbacks are still in the warehouse. Random House gets government mailing or publishing subsidies of some kind and the publisher is afraid of revenge if they release the book and it costs the Tories a bunch of seats…but they win any way. Or, the skittish bosses at Rndom House don’t want to take any chances that this could happen, and reschedule for May 3, just in case.
But what Bene D guesses makes lots of sense too.
Kudos to Bene D for seeing this, BTW.
If I might add this–Why this is significant is that Chapters is the 800 pound gorilla of new book sales in Canada. To my knowledge there are no prominent independent bookstores selling new books in the city of Vancouver now…the closest I know of is a small chain with a store all the way out in Surrey.
Quick correction—I meant to say independent bookstores in Vancouver catering to a wide audience that do not specialize (such as selling only comics, Christian books, etc.) in some way in selling only certain books…
Rick, I highly doubt this is an issue at Random House. This would be the time to ship every book they have in their possession as it’s critical for the election and I would also bet that they pushed to have it out in time. Releasing or shipping it after the election would detract from a ton of quick sales and their concern, as is any business, would be to make the most profit as quickly as you could.
I would be willing to bet the books are sitting in Indigo’s warehouse somewhere. Perhaps if you phone your local outlets, they may be able to shed a little more light as to whether the books are in their warehouse or not.
Tim–
Yes, the book does lose it’s timeliness and saleability if the Tories lose the election, doesn’t it? But…could Random House have known that we’d be in an election right now?
At any rate, curiouser and curiouser however you look at at, eh?
I’ve got an idea. How about someone call Random House and see if they can confirm whether Indigo has them in their warehouse or not? If Indigo’s not saying anything, why not go to the supplier?
Their numbers are as follows:
Sales and Operations
(905) 624-0672
Editorial and Publicity:
(416) 364-4449
Let us know what you find out if you call.
Chapters/Indigo is showing its allegiances to
a certain political stripe and is restricting sales
of the title until after the election. They also
like to censor (make unavailable) many other
“inconvenient” titles that don’t suit them.
Show your stripe by shopping elsewhere.
So many good bookstores in Toronto have gone
under because of the monopoly by Chapters/
Indigo.
Please, God, let them go the way of Borders.
FWIW, I got my copy of the paperback from the Chapters warehouse back east yesterday…
Good Rick – you can let us know what new material is in the book.^)
Quickly, she has a new afterword in whuich she talks about what Ezra Levant and David Frum wrote. Also, she has mentions of Faytene and Roxanne’s Law and what she perceives as Faytene’s “sense of betrayal”, which I will cite in an upcoming post.
No time to compare page to page yet…
Thanks. Looking forward to it.:^)
Okay…
1) I wrote Chapters and said that I couldn’t find the paperback in the store and asked if it was available. I said I saw it available on Amazon.ca and was trying to do some comparison shopping. They responded on April 28th and said only the e-book was available.
2) I thanked them and wrote again – asked why only the e-book was available (when Amazon had it) and when they planned on making the paperback available. They responded on April 29th and said that I could order it and it would arrive in one to two weeks.
3) I thanked them and let them know that they hadn’t really answered my question and if there was a customer service phone number I could call. They responded on May 2nd and explained that they were waiting on confirmation from the vendor but could now confirm that they have access to all format types and provided me a link of where I could now purchase the book.
So long story short, no real answers from customer service! Not a surprise, but…