So today, Labor Day Monday, also is my birthday. On this lazy birthday day I thought I would treat myself by buying and downloading on my Kindle Stephen King’s new novel “Fairy Tale”, which seems to be getting good pre-release reviews online.
But it’s not due for release until tomorrow! You’d think they could have made the release date say, Sept. 1, so people could buy the book to read over the long weekend. But noooo.
Oh well. If I still go ahead and buy it tomorrow I’ll report back with my impression of it, or I may just get stubborn now since Mr. King’s publisher has let me down on my birthday, and wait months until I get a queued-up copy to rent from my online lending library.
The reviews have been extremely positive so far. Treat yourself a day late. My dad’s birthday was September 5th, and he introduced me to King with Salem’s Lot back in 1975. He would have loved most of the books he missed, I think.
I’ve been pre-ordering books for my Kindle for years and years now, and it seems nearly all of them are released on Tuesdays. All 8 books I’ve currently got pre-ordered fall into that category, from King’s next new one tomorrow to one coming on April 25th next year.
Happy birthday! I’ve seen the very positive reviews & also wish it would come out sooner rather than later. Though I’m retired, so it’s about the wait, not the day.
Back in the days when new movies were released to video stores on VHS and then DVD, it seemed to be always on a Tuesday as well.
I remember being in a video store one Monday evening and a new movie I was really looking forward to that was being released on Tuesday was already there, and employees were unloading boxes of them. But officially, nope, they did not yet exist!
Interesting. Why Tuesday, I wonder? Movies in theaters have typically been released on Friday, but that makes sense because it’s the start of the weekend.
I wonder if it’s something about shipping? For more than two decades, new music was released on Tuesdays, but the in the digital era (precisely: July, 2015. I remember it well) it moved to Fridays.
I was sitting on our porch reading Monday. It was raining. My phone chirped and I read a message about Fairy Tale being released! I had pre-ordered it months ago. I was so happy until I realized the message was telling me it was being released Tuesday.
For whatever, the publishing industry releases books on a Tuesday. No one has yet had an explanation of why this is so.
I also find it very frustrating. If they’re only going to release books on one day of the week, why not Friday? Then most people will have a weekend to wallow in their new treasures.
There was an article upthread which was about record albums on Tuesday which gave an explanation that applies to books as well.
In the olden days for brick and mortar shops, new product would be shipped on Friday and would typically arrive on Monday but sometimes Tuesday. They were embargoed until Tuesday so that the people who got them on Monday wouldn’t have an advantage over the people across town who got them a day later.
So I bought and downloaded the book yesterday, and sat outside reading several chapters on a fine late Summer afternoon. So far it’s just the interaction of the young narrator with cranky old Mr. Bowditch and his dog, no supernatural hijinks yet, but I enjoy Mr. King’s non-supernatural writing as well as anything else he writes. Very readable so far.
I’ll give a fuller book report after I’ve finished.
I’m about halfway through and loving it–but I have a very old and kinda frail doggo too and would really love a chance to fix him but maybe not at THAT much risk!