Scholastic does not know where one fan got ahold of a copy of 'Mockingjay' ahead of
its August 24th release date. Photo: twitter.com/sims
Perhaps one of the most coveted books -- and most difficult to find before August 24th -- is Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins, the third and final book in the best-selling Hunger Games trilogy.
The book doesn't hit stores until August 24th, and Scholastic has been adamant that no advance copies be released to anyone -- not even members of the media. Mockingjay is being closely guarded, much as Scholastic did with the final Harry Potter book and as Little Brown did with the final Twilight Saga book. (Collins herself even wrote a letter to fans, asking them to avoid posting spoilers before and immediately following the book's release.)
But somehow, at least one copy has been leaked to Andrew Sims, the admin for MuggleNet.com -- one of the largest Harry Potter fansites around.
Sims tweeted a photo of the book, sans jacket cover, along with this message:
Thanks to a very kind friend, I'm about to start Mockingjay. Join me on my red eye flight to read along.
But Scholastic insists no advance copies are going out, and they're puzzled as to how Sims got his hands on a copy.
"We are not releasing copies in advance of 8/24/10," said Sheila Marie Everett, Collins' publicist at Scholastic. "Scholastic did not provide this person with a copy of Mockingjay. In fact, I haven't even read it yet!"
The Hunger Games Examiner asked Sims for a comment, but as of this time he has not responded.
UPDATE: Sims responded to a request for a comment, saying "I don't really have any comment and honestly I'm just hoping for it to pass. I didn't expect it to get such a reaction!"
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Comments
Didn't expect that kind of reaction? Uhhh, all of us are eagerly awaiting the book, and with no advance copies, of course we are going to react shocked, jealous and maybe even angry that one person has received a copy of it 2 weeks in advance. He knows things we all want to know! And I doubt it will pass until we all have a copy of the book. LOL! Glad that it seems there is only one out there though, that means less chance of spoilers!
Oh sure, wasn't expecting that kind of a reaction. He knew what he was doing. Whatever.
Andrew would never leak anything. I've been listening to the Podcasts he does for the past 3 years. He's known about things in advance then and has never spoilt anything, he's not stupid - his listeners would hate him if he did anyhting like that.
Sims' excuse is pathetic. Of course he knew it would be a big deal. He's an admin at Muggle.net. He's quite aware of embargoes and street dates.
I don't think he'd spoil the book or anything but he obviously knew what he was doing when he posted that picture. I don't think anyone would expect not to get a reaction from that.
Everyone's just jealous of Andrew! I admire him for not ratting out whoever gave that to him! ;) Can't wait to read it!
I agree with everyone who thinks Andrew Simms is mocking us all when he said that he didn't expect to get the reaction that he got. I'm sure that it was EXACTLY the reaction he expected, otherwise why would he mention it publicly to begin with? He could have just read it in piece and kept the knowledge to himself, but he didn't and I for one things that there is a reason for it.
Jealous? No. I just think that if he had the book, he should have kept the info to himself, at least until the book was officially out for everyone. He knew that people would be upset about him having the book, when it was well known that Scholastic was NOT giving out ARCs this time around, and then this guy comes along and talks about having an official book, on Twitter of all places? And posting a picture of the book to prove it? Even some @ Scholastic have admitted to having not read the book yet. Please, he knew what he was doing and got exactly what he wanted, attention.
Please, the publisher loves the advance publicity!
I can believe that Andrew didn't expect the reaction his post got. The majority of his followers belong to the HP fandom, not the Hunger Games group (although I'm not saying the two are mutually exclusive).
Also, as has been pointed out already, Andrew has never spoiled anything for the listeners of his podcasts, so why would he spoil this?
I view twitter as a platform for sharing the exciting things in my life, so I certainly would brag there if I had an advance copy of Mockingjay. Maybe it wasn't the wisest thing for Andrew to do, but everyone slips up once in a while. Cut him some slack, guys.
Everyone else tweets their life. Why can't Andrew? Get over it. Yeah, he got the book early. But, it's just a squeaking week. It's not like your waiting for a heart transplant. It's a book. Don't freak out on him. He probably just wanted to tweet his good fortune, and didn't expect his followers/stalkers or whoever to make such a big fuss about it.
Several teachers at my school received their preordered copies of Mockingjay in the mail today from Scholastic. The cartons were marked "Do not open until August 24." WHATEVER!!! I am jealous that I have to wait until Tuesday to get mine from Hastings. Scholastic can't say they didn't "release" the book early.
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