THE BOBIVERSE SIGNED COLLECTOR’S EDITION ADVENTURE by Ethan Ellenberg
I’ve read that most people overestimate their abilities and our creation and publication of Dennis E. Taylor’s BOBIVERSE SIGNED COLLECTOR’S EDITION illustrates this quite beautifully.
When Dennis first suggested to me that there was an audience for a hardcover edition I wasn’t skeptical as much as I was wary. Despite my long years in publishing book production was way outside my area of expertise. I knew this would be a challenging project and would involve a substantial outlay of capital. Over a short period of time we decided to give it a go and so the wheels began to turn.
The project quickly went from a hardcover edition to a signed, boxed set, dramatically increasing the costs and the complexity but both Dennis and I felt that if we were going to create something truly special for the hardcore fan, this was it.
I contacted my illustrator designer Matt Forsyth who lives on the Great Barrier Island, a little place off of New Zealand. He’d never done anything like this before. We were all set. Next we began to search for a printer and after spending a day or two reading the quotes we had gotten I realized I was exactly NOT the man for the job. There are so many decisions that go into the production of a hardcover book that you do need expertise. Using my industry contacts I hired Cindy Tiger out of Colorado and she stepped into orchestrate the entire production. With Cindy on board things went
relatively smoothly. We hired a printer. We were waiting for news of the successful printing of the books when we got exciting news—the printer was closing—in 48 hours. I was convinced that all that work and all that money had gone up in smoke but luckily we received a true reprieve. The BOBIVERSE books had actually been printed before the drop dead date and were sitting in the printer’s warehouse. After a hectic 48 hours, the payment of our final bill, the hiring of a new fulfillment house and the shipment of the books, the BOBIVERSE trilogy was sitting sedately in its new home in Michigan.
We weren’t quite done yet. To West Virginia we headed for the printing of the slipcase and when that was done they were shipped to Michigan where the trilogy was assembled and shrink-wrapped.
So here is where we stand today and I’ve mainly written this piece to assure everyone who has bought the signed boxed set that they truly have a unique and high quality item. Only 989 copies of the boxed set exist. We have some extra stock and 11 unassembled boxes so the maximum number of copies of this signed first edition are 1003. We’ve got about 100 signed copies of each of the books but with no more than 11 unassembled boxes we don’t foresee any further books ending up in the a boxed set. 1003 should be the limit.
So that’s it. If you’ve bought a copy of the signed first edition boxed set it’s one of 1,003. If we ever do reprint it, the second edition will be clearly marked second edition. Most importantly, we could not be happier with the final product. The actual box is perfectly produced heavy paperboard with a 360-degree lacquered exterior, and it’s beautiful. The books are case bound and in pristine condition. Dennis has personally signed every single book. For Bobiverse fans it’s the one and only perfect collectible from this great science fiction odyssey and we went on quite a trip of our own to produce and publish it.