Yep. The Pappas family has done very well for itself. Ironically, I am not aware of a Pappas Greek restaurant.

Correction: I see they now have Yia Yia Mary's, Pappas Greek Kitchen restaurant in Houston.

As time passes (12 months now since the shipment of volumes 7-21) and nothing changes, I'm reminded of the unending transaction at the front of the long ticket line in which Ragle waits at the Nonpareil bus station in Philip K. Dick's Time Out of Joint.

I think the VE is increasingly likely to simply and quietly come to a halt, unfinished, despite past promises and despite the work that's gone into unpublished volumes. Only a handful of people would even notice if this (again) occurred, given the Prize Trust's nonexistent effort to promote the set. Although I can't claim to know for certain, I have reason to believe the number of subscribers never exceeded 200. At some point, those who stuck it out (i.e., who didn't return their Meisha Merlin volumes and receive a refund from the Trust in 2007), as well as any post-2007 subscribers, will be refunded their payments; the Trust will eat the costs incurred so far (and consequently perhaps wait a bit longer to award its second $500K Heinlein Prize, assuming that future awards will occur); and that will be that - except for boxes of unsold copies of volumes 1-21 and the remaining slipcased MM volumes 1-6.

This isn't a matter of hope or patience; facts are facts, and deep skepticism rather than self-delusion is in order. The chances seem quite low that the Trust will find a competent and affordable successor to Windhaven or will make the effort necessary to increase its subscriber pool. If someone here believes the contrary - that Heinlein's literary executor and the other two trustees will somehow fulfill the responsibility they chose to undertake, thereby ensuring that the VE will be completed in a blaze of glory - kindly speak up.

Don't understand what you base this position on, as there is a certain amount of contrary evidence on this thread -- i.e., I've been reporting the ongoing work as it occurs. As it happens after I finish the morning chores, I'm doing a final look-over To Sail Beyond the Sunset, which means that more than three-quarters of the pre-production work for the entire series is done -- which means that far more money has been spent already than can be saved by halting production.

I further don't understand why you believe "a competent and affordable successor to Windhaven" could not be found, if necessary. Conditions in the book industry are no easier than anywhere else. Book production skills and talents are widely distributed, and if work is available there will be enthusiastic bidding for it. My (rather peripheral) view of the technical end of the industry doesn't support this claim. Sean has mentioned five small presses that might be candidates, in casual discussions.

The only reason,for instance, I wouldn't suggest NitroPress is that the interesting part of the production project is long over and I doubt Jim would be particularly interested in the project at this stage (though I could be wrong).

In my estimation, facts are facts and neither skepticism nor optimism are in order. It's certainly not impossible that the Prize Trust might dump the project (this was David Silver's prediction at the very start, you may remember) -- but I dont see economic up-sides and the economic downsides of either alternative seem to me to weigh more on the finish-the-project side.

I will say that I didn't believe the original estimates of four finished books per month when I first heard it -- and it's not a schedule I could have accommodated, even in so limited a role as the final resort for proof queries.

Quick aside: one of the downsides attached to changing production companies from Windhaven is that we would have to retrain the personnel in the editorial and production peculiarities of this set. This was not an inconsiderable obstacle, and we've already had to do it two and a half times (once for Meisha Merlin, once for Nancy at Windhaven, and then a partial retrain when Nancy became ill and Andrew assumed the lead in the production work). The thought of having these books subjected to the same kind of assault the copyediting and typesetting of the biography has endured makes me shudder.

Although there is an economic dimension in this, there are more than economic considerations involved, and I believe the decision to accommodate Windhaven's slowdown was the best under the circumstances.

I'm not privy to the decision-making process for the VE, but changing production companies is something I would regard as a very-last-option. I would pretty much have to be forced to it.

Oh... baloney. Any competent publisher or book producer should be able to take up the nuances of a project in a very short time.

Unless, of course, the evaluation was other futzy, midlist niche publishers barely competent at their own self-devised processes. Then, yep, you'd have to train them from scratch and hope they remain financially stable long enough to actually move things forward.

With all due respect to Mr. Patterson and his accomplishment, I was hoping for other views from subscribers or onlookers who don't have a unique personal investment in time and effort put into the VE, as he does.

The question at hand, now that it's been raised by Sean himself in his e-mail reproduced upthread, isn't so much whether another vendor than Windhaven has to be chosen (which seems self-evident; see any of the last dozen entries at editrx.livejournal.com), nor whether vendors exist that can quickly take over the project (they do); it's whether the trustees, given their demonstrated history of decision-making, have learned anything about how to search for one.

"Next Industry FOAF on the list" has worked great so far, why change the plan?

Not baloney: it's a matter of actual experience.

It's not a question of retraining in the basics of production standards -- it's a question of retraining from industry-standard to the rather peculiar standards of this particular series. The standards can be stated very simply, but are complicated in practice: the first edition hardcover text is our standard, except that we correct clear and obvious errors only.

One problem that has come up each time is illustrative: the first two or three sets of proof queries we get back from a new proofreader tend to be overloaded with questioning the author's language -- something that is standard practice in general publication, but completely out of the question for this series. It's particularly a problem because Heinlein's prose is rich in idioms, and people whose . . . um, how do I say this delicately? . . . exposure to different dialects has been minimal simply don't recognize constructions that were contemporary slang in the period. So the amount of "false positives" can be overwhelming for me.

Dealing with the newbies and retraining them tends to be a time-consuming and exhaustingly detailed process -- for me, as I'm the one who has to look up every exception between original manuscript (and sometimes, as in the case of Red Planet, different versions of the manuscript) and the pdf of the current run. The manuscripts are all non-searchable pdfs, and when you're trying to find a particular comma usage, it can be a considerable amount of time just to *find* the item under question.

Won't address the other issue you raise, but this looks to me like a band-aid to preserve the false assumption built into the original post --i.e., that no progress at the gross level of public relations means the project is collapsing -- or has collapsed, or something.

So far as I can tell -- and I report my experience as it occurs -- the level of production is perfectly consistent with no loss of commitment but a significantly diminished ability to do the production rapidly. In the case of Windhaven, there are significant health issues; in the case of Sean, he's a first-year law student, and I really don't know what else is to be expected.

I know of no condition that imposes significant additional expenses to the completion of the project. Monies paid to a new production company are not being paid to Windhaven. The printing contracts were set by negotiation a few years ago, and there are no new fulfillment costs. Indeed, finding a new production company to get the work out faster would probably entail a higher cost -- another factor that probably weighs against that option.

As I said, I don't see the factual grounds for thinking the issues you raise are particularly more likely than others.

At the Centennial, J. Buckner Hightower defined the goals of the Prize Trust with respect to the legacy issues: there are several items that have to be in existence in order for any writer to enter long-term academic discussion: there has to be a reliable biography; there has to be a collected works that will constitute a standard edition; and there has to be a contemporaneous critical overview. Unless the legacy gets redefined (not impossible but no evidence so far), getting this collected works finished is a subsisting part of the Prize Trust's agenda, for considerations other than the economic features of the particular project.

...with two futzy, midlist, peculiar publishers.

A publisher truly worthy of the title - that is, not just someone who found you can get a Word manuscript between covers pretty easily these days, and any darn rotten way they see fit - would be able to adapt very quickly to the needs of this project. There is *nothing* about the VE that is very far outside the lines of any such projects, for all the truly unique points you might list. The very specific nature of the content is neither here nor there; a competent publisher could be told, and would accept, that their editorial input was not required or desired. (Copy editing only, and within established guidelines - end of subject.)

The two choices so far of this critical provider/partner have been staggeringly poor - about as poor as could be - and seem to have been based on a chummy conversation at the right time in an evening bar at a con.

I assure you there are competent book producer/publishers out there who would take up the reins smoothly and never give the project a single further hiccup; who would, in fact, bring the value of genuine expertise to the effort. They are unlikely to be "friends" of anyone in the VE circle, however, and might actually need to be *gasp* sought out like any other professional service partner.