Here today, gone today

The marketing for the audiobook editions of the classic vintage Dark Shadows novels by Marilyn Ross has been ... interesting. Compact disc and/or digital downloads for most of the series appeared on Amazon back in March, but I was told that these advance sales links were anomalies and that "nothing happening" with the books at the time. The name of an actress attached to perform the readings was included with these solicitations,which made these accidental listings seem improbably elaborate. The online concensus was that these new audiobooks were unauthorized recordings being produced by unknown persons ... a conspiracy theory I was not equipped to dispute. Three months later there's a not-insignifcant number of fans who believe these audios are bogus.

But now it looks like they are happening. The proof? Amazon has posted revised (and kind of awful) cover art for the first two books in the line, "Dark Shadows" and "Victoria Winters," with samples of a new, familiar actress perfoming the readings: Kathryn Leigh Scott. You can listen to a sample for yourself HERE.

Good news, right? Who knows! These first two recordings (MP3 CDs available for preorder for $5.86) were scheduled to be released today ... and are now tagged "temporarily out of stock."

You can find "Dark Shadows" available for preorder HERE, and "Victoria Winters" HERE. I guess we'll get them when we get them.

"Marilyn Ross" was the pen name of Dan Ross, a gothic romance hack who wrote more than 300 books over the course of his career. Among those titles are 31 books in the "Dark Shadows" series, published between 1966 and 1972. I'm actually excited about the audio adaptions of this series and delighted that Scott is reading them ... but early indications suggest this effort is going to be a bumpy ride. Buckle up!

UPDATE: I pre-ordered the first audiobook back in March, which is now marked as "shipped" and scheduled for delivery today. I'm on pins and needles.

UPDATE #2: After being marked as "Shipped," Amazon revised my order to "We'll let you know when the product is available." For what it's worth, it appears that "Dark Shadows" and "Victoria Winters" are available as audio downloads from Audible.