Best Cutters of the Best Coast Guard!

Finally.
about 2 months ago – Sun, Nov 24, 2024 at 11:45:44 PM

Hey everyone!

Good news: after seven and a half long years, the first batch of books is in the mail! Trust me, this is as much of a relief to me as it is to all of you very patient folks out there. Next batch should get picked up tomorrow, if the USPS gods are good.

Now, I had hoped to have everything shipped by the end of October (or 6 years earlier), but I'm sorry to say that this past couple of months has not been what I expected. On top of that, a few backers reached out after seeing the book announcement floating around and asked how to update their address (they weren't checking the email they used for the Kickstarter and hadn't seen the instructions - honestly, not their fault at all after this long). I also noticed some of the updated addresses weren't transferring from Kickstarter to Backerkit, where all of the packing lists/shipping labels/add-on purchases are located. In the interest of everyone's book making it to the right place and not to the person who lives in your old house, I checked over the addresses and made corrections, and also reached out to some backers who hadn't updated to see if their addresses were current. Ultimately, this delayed me a bit longer. 

Now, you might be asking why I didn't go ahead and ship the address I knew had been updated. Two reason: one, because Backerkit makes it hard for me to buy the shipping labels in anything other than all-or-nothing bulk, and two, because I knew that splitting the packing lists would be the best way for me to get someone's order wrong. Long story short, I apologize once again - I'm working as fast as I can.

Why can't you just ship us something from Ingramspark or Amazon?

What you're getting is a special edition of the book printed just for you, the OG backers. It contains an extra page that I've signed and that you can personalize (I was originally going to personalize the page for you, but then I realized that not everyone wants their own name in the book, or they use a nickname, etc, so I left it for you to fill in). I also signed every copy of the book, even if you only pledged for the unsigned version. It's the least I can do after this long. However, it means me personally signing and packing hundreds of books, which is the current hold-up.

Will it show up in time for Christmas?

I feel pretty confident we're on track for that. I'm through about half of the books so far, and I've finally worked out a lot of the kinks that were slowing me down early on (like my printer eating 75% of my shipping labels as I printed them). More complex orders will be the slowest to ship (since they're the ones I can autopilot the least), so if your order just contains either a book or a book and two coins, yours is probably either on its way, or will be in the next day or so.

Trust me, I'm really glad to see these things heading out the door. Not just because it's literally freeing up enough floor space for me to move between my kitchen and bedroom without crab-walking, but because after so long, you finally get to see the thing I made for you. And I really, really hope you like it.

Thanks again.

-Brian

DC Area Folks: You're Invited to a Special Event!
3 months ago – Sat, Oct 12, 2024 at 07:48:45 AM

For those of you who happen to be in the DC area, I wanted to invite you to a very special event: the official launch of Best Cutters of the Best Coast Guard! 

I'd be honored to have the people who made this happen there to celebrate with me. I'll be there to talk about the book and sign copies after. The best part is, if you let me know you're coming, I can have your rewards available for pickup at the event!

Sign up here to reserve a spot!

COINS!
3 months ago – Fri, Oct 11, 2024 at 04:54:35 PM

Hi, everyone!

An update: after a few technical issues, some last-minute address corrections, and a few storm-related delays, your books are here, getting signed and prepped to ship. But that's not all. I want to tell you about the ever-coveted challenge coins.

First, some bad news

When I first made this Kickstarter, I promised two types of coins, one of Bear made specifically for this project, and also the "Do you just stand there and guard the coast all day?" coins that I made along with my first book. These coins were always super popular, but unfortunately, the company that made them, Northwest Territorial Mint, merged with another company and the original dies were destroyed. This means I can't make more of those coins.

Second, the good news (which makes the bad news into great news)!

I was about to contact Ranger Coin (the successor to NTM) and ask them to recreate the original die when I realized that challenge coin technology has come a long way since 2015, and there's a lot of new options that weren't available last time. On top of that, while I liked my original coins, I always thought they were imperfect. That brown sand never looked right, for one, and the "Warning: Coast!" sign was hard to read against the yellow lacquer. I thought to myself: why not just make a better, cooler, more unique coin?

So I did.

Ta-da! My new challenge coin, just over 2" in diameter, cut in the shape of my Coastie character's head, with my most famous scene on the back. The sand is sandblasted metal with clear lacquer, and the palm tree is semi-transparent lacquer to give the illusion of bark. The Coastie's body is UV-printed onto the coin to make it look super accurate. They even used the actual fonts from my comic, which is a detail I really appreciate. I absolutely love them! It's definitely something that will stand out on your coin shelf/coin rack/pog collection.

But what about the Bear coin?

So what really surprised me when I went to make the Bear coin was the question I got from the rep at Ranger Coin about it: "That's the one that sank, right?"

I was blown away. She actually knew the story of the original Bear, a boat even many Coasties don't know about. She was a big fan of the Coast Guard, and a big fan of Coast Guard history. She was excited to be helping with a project like this, and I was excited to have her help, especially since the story of Bear is what made me want to write this book. And she and her team made me a truly awesome coin:

Semi-transparent lacquer in the water and sky to make the ocean shimmer and the clouds have depth, a UV-printed ship that shows all of Bear's fine details, the exact, woodcut font I wanted in the banner and on the rim, and - just for fun - a glitter iceberg. I think this is one of the best-looking coins I've ever seen (I'm biased, but it's true). I only ordered a handful of extras beyond what I needed for you folks, but after seeing them, I may have to order some more.

Anyway, I've got a busy weekend ahead of me as I sign books and print labels. As always, thank you!

-Brian

P.S., if you have any alibis related to your shipping address, this is your last chance to tell me!

Books are printing!
4 months ago – Wed, Sep 18, 2024 at 10:16:02 AM

BOOKS.

After all this time, it's finally happening! Your books are printing and will soon be on their way to me in one uncomfortably-large delivery. After that, I sign and ship them to you along with your other rewards. I'll keep you posted once they get here.

THE BOOK IS LIVE!

As of today, the book is officially on sale, and is available on Amazon (in hardback and Kindle versions), on Bookshop.org, and directly from IngramSpark (where you can get a limited-time discount of $15 off the cover price).

LAST CALL FOR ADDRESS UPDATES.

You should have received a survey from Kickstarter to allow you to update your address. If you haven't filled it out already, please do so as soon as possible. Those of you who ordered add-ons from BackerKit may have also seen a separate survey from them. If you did, please take a look at that one as well, though it should have already pulled your most-recent address from Kickstarter.

BACKERKIT ADD-ONS.

If you ordered add-ons through BackerKit after the Kickstarter closed, such as additional books or coins, please also make sure your payment method is up-to-date in your BackerKit profile. You should have seen an update from them about it this week, but if not, you can find the BackerKit page here.

I think that's it for now. Tell your friends! Here's a QR code you can use to share it:

How to Update Your Shipping Address
5 months ago – Mon, Aug 12, 2024 at 10:52:00 PM

This post is for backers only. Please visit Kickstarter.com and log in to read.