I know you’ve all been pantingly eager to find out when Barnes and Noble fixes the big book problem that I’ve discussed (in mind-numbing detail) before. Being the eager sort, I finally waded through their voice mail system, waited on hold for about 45 minutes to get “digital support,” and talked to a very nice guy named Sergio.  Sergio told me that B&N had actually fixed the problem and submitted it to Apple for approval, or checking, or whatever the heck it is that Apple does before they push a product out to iTunes.  (Sergio says, “They keep everything locked down pretty tight.”)

Well, here’s the latest news direct from the mouth of the good folks at B&N:

We’ve made several improvements to our service which will provide you with a better reading experience. eBooks now open faster so you can get right to your reading, and you can begin turning pages or jump to a table of contents right away.

We’ve also heard of a few problems opening new eBooks purchased after our most recent software update. We apologize for any inconvenience; if you have experienced this, there is an easy fix:

1. Simply remove the ebook from your iPhone / iPod touch by swiping from left to right across the title in the list view and tapping the “delete” button when it appears.
2. Then tap “My Online Library” and re-download it to your iPhone / iPod touch.

We’ll continue to make further improvements and add new features, based on feedback we’ve received from the nearly 1 million customers who have downloaded the app.

We’ll release a great new version of the B&N eReader early in the New Year.

So, does this fix the big book problem that I described before?  Amazingly, yes, it does!  But because I’m paranoid and thorough, I went through a lot more steps than B&N listed:

1. Delete B&N software off of iTunes.
2. Quit iTunes.
3. Reboot iPhone.
   
4. Sync iTunes with iPhone to delete B&N software.
   
5. Repeat steps 2&3.
6. Download the B&N eReader to iTunes again.
7. Sync iPhone.
8. Open up the B&N reader on my iPhone.
9. Tap “My Online Library” to re-dowload all my books.

And amazingly, it worked.  Truth to tell, I didn’t expect it to; this sounds like a change they made to their site, not the app (with the new version of the app coming out in the next few weeks).  But for whatever reason, the big book problem is gone.  Yay!

(Now if I can only figure out how to get the B&N reader to read my existing Fictionwise library, I’ll be one happy camper.)

Another couple of things:  as B&N notes the books do download quite a bit faster (say 1.5 minutes for a big ol’ book now, vs. 3-4 minutes previously), and another bug I noticed (but didn’t bother to report) is that the download progress bar at the bottom now works properly.

So re-download the B&N eReader app, you big-book fiends, and while away the remainder of 2009 with Infinite Jest or Quicksilver or The Stand or whatever.