First stupid problem with KDP people

[Robert Bidinotto]

Allow me to blow off some steam....

Until now, I have had nothing but great service with KDP. But this morning, I got the following message:

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Dear Publisher,

During a quality assurance review of your title, we have found the following issue(s):

Title has punctuation and typo issue in it. Few examples are mentioned below:

*Location 811; Unnecessary comma - "a sofa back, and"
*Location 813; Unnecessary comma - "solid-brass, boattail"
*Location 1088; an appropriate word could be used in the place the letter "J"
 
Please look for the same kind of errors throughout and make the necessary corrections to the title before republishing it.

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"...before republishing it"?

Now, I find that my book  is listed as in "DRAFT" status on my KDP Bookshelf! This book has been published and selling very successfully since June 21.

I have to assume that these two events -- plus my inability to get sales statistics for hours -- are related. I just sent a fuming letter to KDP making the following points:

Whoever on the KDP "quality assurance" staff sent this message needs to go back to school.

I'm a professional editor and a lifelong professional writer. My book was heavily proofread by multiple individuals prior to publication. My use of commas in a series conforms to "The Chicago Manual of Style," in which the next-to-last item in a series is followed by a comma. And my use of the letter "J" was in the term "J school" -- an abbreviation for "Journalism School." It was used in dialogue and intended as slang during a conversation.

I am astonished that staff at KDP (a) are wasting time proofreading books, and (b) do not have the basic skills that such a job requires. If this staff member's incompetence has caused my book to revert to "draft" status, that individual deserves to be fired.

[Mel Comley]

OMG! I'm flabbergasted, what are they doing there, do they know?

I've had emails from them before not in proper English having obviously come from someone in India or somewhere other than either UK or USA.

I was even woken by a manager at 3am because I demanded an answer as to why they kept mislaying my cheques!

I'm really not sure what is going on over there any longer. 

[MrPLD]

Wow, now this will be interesting to see how it pans out.  If they're doing things like that, I think about 80% of the books on Amazon will be turfed O_o.

I wonder if it was a reader that thought they were "fixing things" and submitted those to KDP?

[daveconifer]

This is really weird to me, because, as others have said in other threads, a complaint like this probably originated as a reader comment (and if that's  incorrect, my post is not useful).  I'm surprised to see a warning go out about commas, which are often judgment calls.  RB is a rather accomplished writer and I'm guessing that although not every reader might agree, these commas are okay.

Did somebody really flag the use of the term "J school" as a grammatical error?

I don't think this is the right approach to quality control but maybe I'm missing something here...

[Kathleen Valentine]

That is upsetting. I'd be angry too.

As an aside, Robert, I downloaded the sample of Hunter last night and liked it a lot. So another book to add to my endless list!

[DevonMark]

This is quite unbelievable. In fact I had to read twice to make sure you weren't spinning us a wind-up. There are hundreds of books out there with very poor formatting and many, many errors. If Amazon are going to start getting fussy then it would be better they started with them rather than (mistakenly, as you point out) with your book.

Still stunned that this is really happening.

[David 'Half-Orc' Dalglish]

Two commas and a slang term in dialog.

Consider me unimpressed with this sort of "quality control". And sadly, I've heard others with similar complaints, all with dumb fixes. I'm just waiting to get my own.

[Lexi Revellian]

This is quite unbelievable. In fact I had to read twice to make sure you weren't spinning us a wind-up. There are hundreds of books out there with very poor formatting and many, many errors. If Amazon are going to start getting fussy then it would be better they started with them rather than (mistakenly, as you point out) with your book.

Still stunned that this is really happening.

My guess is that Amazon is doing something about poorly-edited and formatted books because of customer complaints. They just aren't doing it quite right at the moment. Very annoying for Robert - as a writer who cares deeply about presenting my books as perfectly as possible, I'd feel the same.

Lexi

[Jon Olson]

Two commas and a slang term in dialog.

Consider me unimpressed with this sort of "quality control". And sadly, I've heard others with similar complaints, all with dumb fixes. I'm just waiting to get my own.

They're scholars first, and they do tech on the side. (Hm, comma there, or not?)

[daveconifer]

I know the conspiracy theories have been scoffed at, but to me this is part of how things have changed for the worse for independent writers since late Spring.  It's shocking to me that this book was actually taken off the sales rack...

 
My newest book is about a guy who spent eleven years in prison.  He says "ain't" a lot, and usually says "don't" when he's supposed to say "doesn't."  If "J school" gets flagged, I'm in big trouble...

 

[Chrystalla]

Very strange! Waiting to hear what they reply... 

[T.K. Richardson]

This is wrong on so many levels. What's next?

[BSquared18]

A glance at your sample shows clean, well-written narrative and dialogue. And your reviews are ones that most authors would die for.

Would you be willing to post the complete sentences that the Word Police are having a problem with, so that we can judge for ourselves?

Bill

[melissafmiller]

Robert,

First off, just . . . wow.

Second, I know you said it is showing as "In Draft" on your bookshelf, but it does appear to still be for sale.  In fact, I just purchased it, and it is currently downloading to my phone.  

[Joyce DeBacco]

Yes, some kind of quality control is needed. But to take a reader's opinion on corrections is totally wrong. If they plan on instituting controls they need someone at the helm who has a good grasp of grammar, punctuation, and spelling. Too much of my correspondence with them has been rife with errors. And if this is the person who decides our books are lacking, woe to all of us.

Joyce

[Robert Bidinotto]

Thanks for the sympathetic support, people. I just needed to ventilate.

And also thanks for the suggestion that this was probably due to a customer complaint. Now that makes sense. I've had a few "refunds," and I wonder now if somebody used such lame excuses to get his or her money back?

[N. T. Amblin]

Was that message copied and pasted?

If so, then they have at least one incompetent person doing quality control. Look at the writing:

Title has punctuation and typo issue in it. Few examples are mentioned below:

They don't understand plurals, or that the second sentence makes no sense as written and should be "A few?" They also don't know how to use semicolons properly. And if they can't distinguish the difference between narration and dialogue . . . .

They have people who can't write scouring books for editing issues. I wonder how many are native English speakers? I get the impression from this message that this one might not be. Brilliant!

[T.K. Richardson]

 I read in another thread about someone complaining to Amazon about typos and they received their money back. Could be starting a trend. Read, complain, get money back.

[Jnassise]

Not sure if its been mentioned upstream, but this is often the result of a complaint from a customer and isn't a result of a staff of Amazon editors wading through random books.

[N. T. Amblin]

Thanks for the sympathetic support, people. I just needed to ventilate.

And also thanks for the suggestion that this was probably due to a customer complaint. Now that makes sense. I've had a few "refunds," and I wonder now if somebody used such lame excuses to get his or her money back?

I'm sure that's what happened. There's no way they have people reading books for errors. Probably after a couple of refunds they flag it and have someone (who is clearly incompetent) check it out based on the complaints.

I certainly wouldn't worry about it. Your message back to them summed up your position perfectly. Hopefully they'll consider that.

[Robert Bidinotto]

Melissa, that is so sweet of you!

Okay, folks, for your amusement: the wildly offending sentences, in context. Are you ready?

First, an FBI agent is briefing people about a crime scene:

“Ballistics retrieved a piece of the bullet from inside the house. Way inside. After going through Muller’s skull, it passed through the outside wall, a kitchen cabinet, a coffee pot on the table, a hallway door, a sofa back, and another interior wall before lodging near the bottom of a bedroom wall. We were lucky to get a big fragment. We figured it had to be a .50 caliber. But the lab determined it came from a Barrett .416 cartridge. That particular cartridge propels a high-velocity, 400-grain, solid-brass, boattail spitzer bullet.” He noticed blank looks and smiled sheepishly. “Okay, sorry, that’s a sniper round, fairly new and relatively rare. It was designed by the Barrett Firearms Company in 2005...."

So much for the offensive commas. Now, for "J":

"Look, I’m not gonna lie to you. You’re the best investigative reporter I’ve run into in a long time. I don’t know where you got your training—but that’s the point! I don’t know a goddamned thing about you. Where you come from. Where you went to J school. Who you worked for before, where you live, whether you have a wife or kids or a dog—”

“Cat.”

Are you properly incensed about my vandalism of our mother tongue?

[Andrew Biss]

That is ridiculous. Now some hired help at Amazon are dictating to authors whether they can or cannot use the serial (Oxford/Harvard/Chicago Manual) comma (among other things)? Even if this is a result of a customer complaint, it still makes no sense. These are choices made by the author, not grammatical errors.

Mind boggling! Sorry this has happened to you, Robert. It would seem none of us are safe from this nonsense.

[Joansz]

So, do we now have to challenge reviews that cite so-called errors?

Very upsetting. BTW, do you have this book on Smashwords? I don't have a Kindle, although I do have my books available through KDP.

[BSquared18]

I'd say what I really think, but then the Word Police might come knocking at my door too, virtually speaking.

Your writing is obviously too good for this to become a serious problem. (And honest, folks, I'm not his brother-in-law.) 

Let's see: should I have put commas around folks or not? And, uh, should should have been capitalized? Ye Gods. It never ends!

Bill

[Gretchen Galway]

I think you should tweet/blog this to the rafters. It's too crazy. "Amazon pulls novel for using Oxford comma!"

Have you heard this great song?

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n43LduK2Yq8" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n43LduK2Yq8</a>