I feel like the chap who wasn't given an invite to the party all his friends are at. I can't get hold of a copy of Nick Cohen's new book for love nor money. I've tried the publishers, I've tried Amazon, and I've tried Waterstones and Borders. All to no avail. Blank stares from the assistants at the latter two, a 2-5 week delivery promise from Amazon and no response from Fourth Estate.

I assume I'm not the only one who can't get hold of it. It must be incredibly frustrating for Nick. I had a similar experience ten years ago when A Class Act was published. My co-author and I had worked out with the publishers a PR strategy all geared around the date when Penguin said it would be in the shops. We pulled off the unique feat of getting it extracted on the same day on the front of the reviews sections of both the Sunday Times and the Observer. We had op-eds everywhere. We had news coverage. We had chat shows. Wall to wall.

And could you get the book anywhere? As if. Penguin didn't release copies into the shops for another three weeks. All that publicity went up in smoke.

(I had a very different experience with Hodder, who turned around my Blunkett book from delivery of the final pages of manuscript to appearing in the shops in 10 days - a breathtaking performance.)

UPDATE: I'm told it's in to its second printing and new copies are on their way. Congratulations to Nick Cohen for such a success.