Okay, first, this book should never, ever have been sent.  It has SERIOUS water damage (I hope it's water, though it's pretty brown), has garbage on it, and is just generally gross.

But the problem that I'm having now is that the book was never marked mailed.  It's still sitting in my "requested books" area.  I want to be sure that the sender gets a ding on their record for sending out something this awful.  There's no way this is transit damage, as the packaging is clean and these stains look old and moldy.

Should I report this to the PTB?  Do I wait til it's been marked mailed?  Do I PM the sender and ask what the hell they were thinking sending something this nasty?  Okay, not the last one, but wow.  This is by FAR the worst damage I've ever seen -- this is the kind of damage to a book that would land it in my recycle bin, which is just where this went -- I'm not even bothering to read this nasty thing.

I'm probably a little extra irritated because this is like the third water damaged WL book I've received in the past couple of weeks and it's just getting frustrating.  I've still had far more positive transactions than negative ones here, but this one is definitely the worst.  Most of the water stains I've received have been very minor and things that I could understand being overlooked, but that's definitely not the case here.

To make this more confusing, I'm also showing here that she used printable postage with DC.  So she's not marked it received, but the system DC is showing (correctly) that it was mailed on the 4th and received today.  And if she used this, she has definitely received her credit.

Actually if she never marked it mailed, she may not have gotten her credit even if the DC was scanned.  It looks like the system has already ordered you another copy. 

I would PM PBS and ask what to do about this. 

She did not mark the book mailed, so she did not get the credit.  I think you are now in line for another copy of the book and that request is pending with another person.  If I were you, I'd allow that transaction to go through so you can get a new copy of the book.  You'll still be out only one credit.

As far as the first book goes...I'd contact the PBS team to tell them of the situation and see what they advise.

Yeah, I don't think the system has ordered me another copy yet (especially since this is a WL book).  The book was to be mailed on August 4th, which is what the DC shows.  I know that it generally doesn't mark not as mailed until a few days after they forgot to mark it mailed.  But yeah, I guess if it times out, I'll get my credit back. 

All I know is that this is by far the worst book I've received.  This was no accident where someone just didn't see the stain (I've received a few of those, and while I mark RWP, I almost never ask for my credit back on stuff that could pretty easily be missed), this was a hugely disgusting book.  It looks like half a pop got dumped on it.  Two years ago so it had time to get moldy.  And then someone blew their nose on it.

:::shudder:::

Oh, and there's no question that I'll order a new copy of this if it does time out.  I love Sarah Vowell's stuff and there's no way that I'm reading a book in the condition that that one was sent.  I just won't do it.  I have a pretty high gross-out tolerance, but this was beyond even what I can stand.

Definately mark it RWP (with all the details you have here). The sender should not get credit for mailing you that junk, and this needs to be on her record. If TPTB see that this is an ongoing problem, they'll take the proper action against her account.