mediabistro.com’s GalleyCat has the story about a potential thief in the mailroom at CNN’s NY headquarters. Turns out one of the books that passed through the mailroom was signed by the author and meant to be delivered to a CNN producer. The author says he’s doing some “Sherlock Holmesing” to find the culprit.
“I received an email from someone who bought IN THE EVENT OF MY UNTIMELY DEMISE from a third party vendor on Amazon. He was curious why his new book was signed with a note to a guy named Evan. First I thought I was being pranked. How could someone buy my book on Amazon and receive a copy that I’d personally signed and mailed to Evan, a producer at CNN? Too weird. But I emailed Evan — and he said he’d never received the book. Hmm. We did a little Sherlock Holmesing and came to realize that someone in the TimeWarner/CNN mailroom is actually stealing books that arrive in the mail and re-selling them on Amazon. Isn’t that great? They didn’t bother to open the book and notice that I’d signed it to someone. Now Evan’s working hard to find the thief and teach him or her a valuable lesson in sudden occupational reassignment.”
Maybe an iReporter needs to be dispatched to the mailroom.
> More: A possible explanation from a CNN insider, after the jump…
Is There A Thief in the CNN Mailroom? No. Here’s a much more likely scenario: Author inscribes book to “Evan” a producer at CNN, and mails it to him. “Evan” opens his package which contains the book — one of several he received that day — and after smiling at the personalized inscription, decides he will NEVER read it or do a story ever remotely connected to it. So “Evan” drops it on the table in the break room, where all the other books and magazines are left by all the other producers. Later that day, a poorly paid production assistant or graphic artist or custodian or mailroom delivery person picks up the shiny the new book, takes it home, and sells it on eBay or Amazon. This happens 10 times a day in this building. This is also well-known. Sorry Mr. Author. “Evan” really didn’t care about your book or that you inscribed it to him, but now that he’s been busted for giving it away — he’s blaming it all on a mysterious “mailroom thief.”