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Indexing Now is exactly the same as Indexing Soon - it means that a book has been assigned to an indexer.  In theory this should mean that you will see the index go up in the next few weeks.  However, with member indexers, some books are taking months to complete.  We can't really complain since they are volunteers and we are delighted that they want to index their books.  But it will mean that you may see a book with that status for a long time - if the book is older and not on a lot of Bookshelves then you know it is being member indexed.

Sometimes a newly published book may be hard to get hold of so may take longer.  Some publishers are good about sending us review copies to index, others not so good.  You would think that publishers would be falling over themselves to get their books indexed on EYB but sadly not the case.  Though we are about to start a big push to cookbook publishers to get them to understand what a great opportunity this is for them.

There shouldn't be any books that were Index Soon before the release and now are Request Index - the only status change should be to Indexed.  Are you sure it isn't just that several of your books have all been indexed?  If you can remember any titles for books that you think this has happened to, let us know and I will investigate for you.

Hi Jane,

So then the turn-around time for indexed books that have been submitted is approximately two weeks?

Just wondering how long to expect after I've indexed and submitted a book. It's exciting to see a book you've completed show up as indexed:) Waiting for it to show is like waiting for Christmas morning:)

Thanks

Thanks Jane, as always I appreciate your responsiveness.  Unfortunately I don't recall the books that are no longer there other than Bonnie Stern's Friday Night Dinners. I just know that on average I have about 20-23 books being indexed at any given time and now I'm down to 12.  I did check and FreshMex is the only book added since my last view of Index Soon.  

I agree that it makes no sense for publishers to decline the opportunity to have an early indexing opportunity here.  That said, the business model for publishing needs an entire overhaul...but that's another issue all together!  

Thanks for your response.

Mystery solved.  Sydney, who handles our member indexing, unassigned a whole load of books that had been requested by members but never started.  We do tell members that if they don't start the indexing within 14 days then we will unassign it (so someone else has the chance to request it) but it was a job that hadn't been done for a while.  It was a coincidence that it happened around the same time as the new release. 

So apologies if you were looking forward to those indexes.  Hopefully some other members (who are going to finish them!) will now volunteer.

PatriciaAnn - the turnaround of member indexed books varies depending on how many Sydney has in the queue. At the moment the delay is about 10 days so yours should be approved very soon.

In theory yes but unfortunately we are so overloaded that it's not happening as often as it should.  Sometimes the member says they want to finish it so then we give them more time. Or sometimes we return a book because there are consistent errors (the member doesn't seem to have read the instructions) and then they don't do it.  So we are stuck with books that are close to being finished but the member doesn't seem to want to finish it.  So either we finish it for them (but we would rather focus our resources on books that a lot of members own) or we put the book back up as unindexed with the recipes not showing (which seems a shame).

Sydney and I were just talking yesterday that we need another clearout so we will try to get this done soon.

I'm guilty here -- said I would finish Francisco Ghedini's Northern Italian Cooking a while ago, but haven't.  Could you let Sydney know I'd like to be released? There is a new book I'm eager to index [and I doubt very many people are waiting impatiently for the Ghedini].

Many thanks.