Q. How safe is my information?
A. No information is given on the website, everything is done through paypal. I never see your payment information, only your shipping address.
Q. Will ordering cause me to get ads and mail?
A. No. We do not spam or send mail advertisements without the consent of the receiver. We are working on a newsletter which will go out by e-mail, but that will be by subscription.
Q. How long does shipping take?
A. All of our books are produced by print on demand services.
Ebook: you will get an e-mail upon payment with the download link.
Paperback: In the US, paperbacks take 2-3 days to produce before shipping, sometimes more for large orders. Then they ship from the printer which takes 3-7 days. For international orders one should expect 10-20 days shipping, depending on the country. It is hard to gauge, it will warn me that a place is 3 months (e.g. Guam) but the recipient will tell me they got it in 2 weeks. I do know from experience, however, that if you are in Latin America you should expect a 2 month delay due to customs.
Hardcover: 6-10 days to produce, then about 3-7 days to ship.
Q. Is tracking available?
A. Normally, if tracking is available, we will update tracking info in paypal which will automatically send an e-mail to you with the tracking information. For international orders, tracking is not available.
Q. Are your books available on Amazon?
A. Yes, but we make a little more money here plus the books are often a few dollars less here. If you type “Mediatrix Press”, all our titles will show up on Amazon, though one or two are not ours but indexed because they have Mediatrix in the name somewhere. I should add, if you buy our books please leave feedback, as this helps others buy the book.
Q. I’m not very good with computers and I don’t want to use paypal. Can we do a mailorder?
A. Yes, we are currently working on a mail-order form where you can send a check or money order. In the meantime, you can contact us at: [email protected]
Q. We live in the North Idaho/Spokane, WA area. Is local delivery or pickup available?
A. We do not have the books on hand, generally, although I tend to keep a supply of Franciscan Way of the Crosses and Canisius Catechisms due to their small size. Check first by e-mail on availability. If you preferred we could ship it to ourselves and give it to you, but we still would have to charge the same shipping (therefore why?).
Q. We found possible typos in the books, whom do we contact to correct them?
A. Send an e-mail to [email protected] with the page number and the typo(s). We are human and are happy to acknowledge and fix any mistakes. Do, however, double check that it is not a question of UK vs. US spelling, or that it is not in a quote where antiquated spellings are tolerated.
Q. Are you a Traditionalist or Novus Ordo?
A. We are Catholic, and our books are for all Catholics. The fact that all of our books are from before Vatican II is generally because those works were better and, more importantly, they are out of copyright.
Q. Are you sedevacantist? I saw the Bellarmine translations you sell advertised on sedevacantist websites.
A. No, but we are happy for anyone to advertise our books. It doesn’t follow that because some third party advertises something that the people who produce it agree with them. Still, while we don’t agree with them, most sedevacantists we have known are generally upright and thoughtful individuals.
Q. I ordered one of your books through Amazon and it came damaged or defective. What do I do?
A. Return it to Amazon, I am just a third party in that transaction.
Q. I ordered one of your books through the website and it came damaged or defective. What do I do?
A. This is tricky because I did not handle the book (usually) but the printer packs and ships in an automated process. First, take a picture of the book and the specific defects (out of the box the cover is damaged/bent, pages missing, text blurred and illegible, etc. images are blurred, words are over the text, etc.). In this scenario one of two things happened: a) an error in the printer’s process or b) an error when I produced the pdf to send to the printer. If a) then you will get instructions for shipping it back to them and/or refund; if b) I will issue you a refund or replacement after correcting it.
Q. Do you take submissions from other authors?
A. As a rule we do not, as we are already very busy, however we may make an exception. To be honest, we are probably not the best venue for that and we have little advertising capability. You can contact us via e-mail about this, however.
Q. Are you planning on reprinting books that are in the public domain that other publishers sell?
A. Even though technically we could legally, (provided it is in the public domain) we don’t. Our philosophy is that competition with other publishers should be based on justice. There are plenty of great books to get in print without trying to do what others have already done. We might if the books are produced by someone who has thrown together a lousy facsimile with a stock cover, and we think we can do it better and cheaper. It also depends on the cost benefit ratio and the worthiness of the work. E.g., Baronius press sells a wonderful Rule of St. Benedict. I could throw one together myself, but what is gained by adding to the market and reducing the number of books that can be sold? Do we make enough to pay back our time? No. Catholic publishers should work together as much as possible for the mission of the Gospel, at least it seems to me.
Q. Do your books have an imprimatur?
A. Our reprints all have the original imprimatur which remains valid provided one did not change the substance of the work, unless, by chance there was not one. On our new works there are not imprimaturs because the Church does not require them unless it was to be used for public prayer in community in the Church, or public instruction. We are currently going through the canonical process on a few titles, which will be noted in the product listing.
A further note: many heretical books since the late 1960s have had an imprimatur [e.g. the Dutch Catechism], and I have even found errors in old books with an imprimatur from the 30’s and 40’s. An imprimatur is not a guarantee, nor does it confer infallibility, but a moral certainty that nothing which would have a nota haereseis (mark heresy) or proxima haereseis (leading to heresy) given it by the Holy Office is present in the book. Standards were a lot stricter in the 18th century, but alas. When making the decision to reprint books we do so on the merits of the book, and even if the work were otherwise good but had a serious error in faith in it we would not reprint it. All of our translations are reviewed by a Catholic priest with a PhD who is very faithful.
Q. Are your books made in China?
A. All of our books are made in the USA with American labor.
Q. Why are there so few hardcover books?
A. Hardcover books cannot become available until I have ordered a copy and proofed them. Usually they have already been proofed in paperback and I’m only looking to make sure cover and dust-jacket look good, but still I need to shell out the money (they are even expensive for me at cost). We are currently waiting for the money to order proof copies of several books. We apologize for the cost of these, but we make the same on them as we do on paperbacks, we just can’t eat the cost.
Q. I bought one of your ebooks and I cannot open it. What do I do?
A. Ebooks can only be read on a device (kindle, nook, etc.). Otherwise you need an app on your tablet, phone, pc, mac or whatever to read it. They are not pdfs. Look up what apps are compatible with your device. Kindle offers a free app, and there are other ones. Likewise for ibooks on a mac or epub readers on Windows. Which app to choose is dependent on the specifics of your machine and operating system.
Q. How do I transfer your ebooks to my kindle/nook/whatever?
A. You will need to connect it to your computer, or else transfer it with a usb if it has this capability.
Q. There are used copies of your books on Amazon for hundreds of dollars. Are they out of print?
A. No, people are trying to profit. They list it for hundreds of dollars, then order it new. Avoid these people, you can buy it from us at the retail price. We never run out of stock because there isn’t any, it is printed fresh when you order it.
Q. How can we support your work?
A. Donations are always helpful, but prayer is essential. There are ways, however, that don’t cost more than a few minutes of your time:
-leave positive feedback on Amazon (and if you didn’t like the book, please contact us and tell us why so that we can try to fix what you didn’t like if possible)
-share our work on facebook, or other social media
-leave links on websites and forums where it is appropriate (please don’t spam anyone!).
-talk to your pastor about getting our books in a parish bookstore.
For any more questions, send an e-mail to: contact at [email protected]