Jamie Jensen, author of the “Road Trip USA” and “Road Trip USA Route 66,” sent an e-mail with his response of my review of his “Road Trip USA Route 66” book that was recently published:
Here it is:
I was looking forward to talking to you about my Road Trip USA books, and was sorry to hear about all the mistakes you pointed out to my publisher (and on your website — ouch!).
I wanted to get in touch and say thanks for your input — and perhaps explain (though not excuse…) my errors.
First of all, I would like to confirm that, as you suggest, I am indeed solely responsible for just about everything in the book. Though I wish things were otherwise, I have never had a fact-checker to make sure everything is right. Which means that if I misunderstand or overlook something, or cut and paste the wrong number, there’s no one to catch the mistakes — apart from readers, on whom I have long relied to point out things that were just plain wrong, as well as things that change after publication, or to point out new things that come up along the nearly 40,000 miles of roads which I try my best to cover.
Basically, apart from the production and marketing of the book, which is what Avalon handles, Road Trip USA is pretty much a “one man band” — me!
And though you are certainly right that I could have done better, I do think that for most readers — with the possible exception of the more expert Route 66ers — my books offer far more positive benefits than they cause frustration and disappointment. Much as I wish I had the funding to hire fact-checkers (and photographers, and expert correspondents..!), Road Trip USA is pretty much a labor of love — especially when gas prices were as high as they were for my last edition (2007-2008) travels.
With regard to the Route 66 chapter, and the small Route 66 book — I also have some “mitigating circumstances” which I think may have caused me to overlook some of the details you mention. My main task in the new edition, beside checking and updating all the facts as well as I could, was to turn around the entire route, re-researching and re-writing every section so that the road appears in traditional “Chicago-to-LA” order. This was my focus, and unfortunately it seems while turning the route around I neglected many details (like the radio stations — and I have to agree with you that it’s galling to hear that KMOX is no longer carrying the Cards games! I remember hearing night games on KMOX from hundreds of miles away — Is it right the Cards have in effect bought their own station??)
Also, regarding the extra “m” in Lucille Hamon’s name — this has stood for 15 years without anyone ever mentioning it. Even Lucille herself, to whom I gave one of the very first copies, way back when the book first came out. She read and signed my copy, too — maybe she was too polite to mention my mistake, though in my experience she wasn’t exactly shy ? — and until you pointed it out, I thought I was right.
No excuses, but still…
So, I hope you accept my apology for the errors, which I will fix in all future editions. For what it’s worth, I really have done my best, and I genuinely appreciate your concern about getting things right, so more and more people can have positive experiences out on Route 66 and all the other great roads across America.
An addendum: I was scheduled to participate in a “blogging road trip” organized by Jensen’s publisher to help promote his books. But, as I read “Road Trip USA Route 66” and saw the errors pile up (and in “Road Trip USA” as well), I contacted the publisher a few days before th event was set to begin and said I was backing out. I felt the book’s quality wasn’t high enough to warrant my support.
I appreciate Jensen’s “mea culpa” (as he described it), his willingness to be accountable, and his love of two-line roads. But, as I said in the review, the publisher also has to share the blame for not fact-checking the manuscript. If Jensen is a “one-man band” as he claims, then Avalon Travel has an obligation to make sure the product it’s selling is as good as it can be. At the least, the publisher has more resources to do the double-checking than Jensen does.
UPDATE: On a related note, today I received a call from Avalon Travel’s publicist, who said that the publisher is now hiring a fact-checker, in response to my criticism of the “Road Trip USA” books.
So that’s definitely a step in the right direction.