Author upsets schools over missing books

SHANE COWLISHAW - stuff.co.nz - 29/08/2011

MESS UP: Author Ken Catran, who some schools say has failed to deliver books they ordered, says he has not tried to defraud anyone.

An award-winning author has angered schools nationwide by failing to deliver books they have paid for.

Ken Catran, who has won several New Zealand Post book awards and wrote the Shortland Street line ''You're not in Guatemala now, Dr Ropata'', has taken orders directly from several schools for copies of his teenage fiction books during the past six years.
However, many of those orders have failed to turn up and Catran has been accused of ignoring calls and emails from some of the schools involved.
Six high schools confirmed to The Dominion Post that they had paid for books that never arrived and had struggled to contact Catran. It is understood that at least two more schools are in the same position.
Catran replied by email to the concerns via a teachers' message board two weeks ago, stating that he had only just become aware of the problem and saying that heads of department should email him.
But schools spoken to have yet to receive a response since then.
When contacted at his home in Waimate, Catran said he had paid the money to online distributors in Australia who had ''let me down''.
Full story at stuff.co.nz