Code Monkey Publishing

[Havard]

In a word: Horrid.

But you all knew, or at least figured that, from the silence of the last few months and no release of books at Christmas time.

So what happened? In short, failure of people to adhere to contracts.

I had completed writing (and typing up) of The Dungeons of the Lost Moorlands, Shaedraeth: The Tide of Years (Calendar and event book, short), and Faith & Fervor (Gods & Religious Organizations books)

I had contracted an Editor, a Layout person, an Artist, and a Cartographer

The artist had his list of what's what - They simply failed to deliver on the appointed due date and literally disappeared off the face of the planet (I literally cannot find this person, real life or anywhere on the web now)

The editor failed to deliver on time, started giving me excuses, then simply said they were not going to do the work and refused to return the physical copies and the electronic ones to me.

Without the physical or the electronic copies, I could not get them to the layout person or the cartographer, both of whom are now engaged with other work.

Given our track record of writers, artists, and other sundry, but required people to turn out a book of great quality, I was more than a little incensed. This is not the first time we (CMP) has been shafted by people thatwe've contracted, and in several instances, paid in advance.

So I went after the editor legally. It is considered a civil matter when one is in breach of contract, so I had to do it through the civil courts.

I could not talk about ongoing legal issues, but finally 2 weeks ago, we won. The person was found in breach of contract, required to return all materials within 2 weeks, and has to pay all the legal fees involved.

Well, yesterday was the 2 week mark... and what I got back was... Not everything. Not even close. It was only a part of my written material on Dungeons and the Gods books... and by part I meant about 10% of it. None of the maps, none of the electronic copies...

And their excuse to the judge? My kid set fire to house!!! Which was apparently true it turns out, However the funny thing is, the portions that were returned do not smell of smoke, there's no water damage, and no fire damage. Truly a miracle!

I made note of this to the Judge, the Judge asked this person, this person said that the papers in question were in thier car because they'd left them there from working on them a few months back and 'forgotten they were there'.

???...???...???

Ok, so why the hell didn't I have a backup of the electronic copy? I did.... 3 of them... Hard Drive in my computer and 2 flash drives...

So what the hell happened to them? Electrical surge into my computer. Not enough to cause a 'melt down', but enough to fry my MB, Memory, and Hard Drives... and of course fry both flash drives (and a couple other usb devices I had plugged in).

But that happened before the editor went awol/stupid... So I wasn't overly worried about it, and when I initially asked for an electronic copy back, our schedules simply didn't coincide to get together...

Yes, I know the editor in real life, was a friend of mine that I did trust, and was local to me... Same for the artist...

We (CMP) had tried numerous people for these types of positions before, but mostly people referred to us, came along with previous projects, and almost always we had met only a few times... And given the horrid track record of people before, I decided to use people I know and were local to me for the critical positions needed.

... ... ... ...

I can not describe how angry, frustrated, and in general disgusted I am... I just can't... even those words are not enough...

So what now?

I'm still sorting things out, seeing exactly what I have in hand... rewriting is what's going to happen, I simply have to decide where to start and get to it...

Considering that the total amount of pages was right around 1000 (That's in word, dual column, not art holding spots), it's going to take no little time to rewrite it all.

As for art... I think I'm going to go against the grain and 'common wisdom' and have no art at all in the books... unless I find decent, appropriate, free art somewhere.... There are page/cover templates I've found that can be used for commercial use that I like...

Cartography... Guess I'll finally have to sit down and truly learn CC3...

I know the basics of layout within Adobe's CS...

In other words, I'm simply going to have to do it all... since we (CMP) has had so little luck with hiring outside people that actually adhere to their contractual obligations.


I know, on top of this, that there's going to be some people laughing their asses off at CMP, saying "They can't do anything at all" and just generally knocking us about, etc...

Well out track record so far prooves them right, sadly... and maybe it still will down the road... But I'll be damned if I don't give it my all...

It's all I can do.

W. Robert Reed III
Mynex
- #1 Evil Monkey
- Code Monkey Publishing Owner
- Summum Malorum Simius

The latest from CMP. Not very uplifting.

-Havard