Not only were there no copies of The Cuckoo's Calling at the fair, most dealers had no clew as to what had happened with the book. Dealers are funny about new books going rare like that - they don't trust it, as several frenzies have had their bubbles burst eventually, but in the end if there really were only 1500 copies then this thing is not going to go down. That said, the publisher itself had never owned up to how many copies were printed. The "1500" is pure speculation by dealers trying to sell and they take that number from the publisher's statement about how many copies had been sold. Copies sold, of course, has nothing to do with copies printed. I suspect if it sold under 1500, which it did, that the print run would be closer to 5000 - but maybe it was less than that. No one knows. Except the publisher. And the publisher has not been forthcoming.
