Books and papers that have gotten wet by Captiva fire, flood, and broken pipe can be recovered. It is time-intensive and best left to the professionals, but if you’ve got one or two wet books that
if not dried perfectly you would not fret about, and the time to spare, you can attempt to recover the books yourself.
The most important thing, upon which everything else hinges, is get the book frozen fast. Once the book dries out, the wrinkles and warping are set, and there’s nothing anybody can do about it. But
freeze it, and all damage stops. And the book can stay frozen until you’re ready to handle it.
Wrap the book in a U of wax or freezer paper, or in a plastic bag. It’s best to freeze it at -15F or lower, so if you can get access to a commercial freezer space, it would be a good idea. If
that’s not available, a home freezer will do in a pinch, but the results won’t be quite as good. If possible, freeze the book spine down, and supported so it won’t lean or fall over. If you have
to lay it on its side, make sure that the book is fully and flatly supported. If you have anything under it smaller than the book, the book can and will mold itself to that object. All you will
need is your freezer, a hair dryer and lots of time.
The recovery process is fairly simple:
1. Start with the cover. Open the cover (gently pry loose the inside page, if it’s sticking). Run the air stream from the hair dryer (I’d recommend top settings on both heat and fan) over the
cover, back and forth, top to bottom, and inside and out. When it feels dry and warm to the touch (not hot!) go on to the inside page. Same procedure. Smooth the page with your hand as you work.
Work page to page this way.
2. When the next page starts to feel wet to your fingers, that are not frozen, stop. Stick in a piece of paper as a bookmark, and put the book back in the freezer. Take out the next book (if
there’s more than one) and start on it. Leave the first book in the freezer for at least a day.
3. Covers may soak up more moisture than the pages, so you may have to do the cover several times. Just keep the book frozen, and work only so long as it’s frozen, quitting when it starts to thaw.
4. There are a few circumstances which are a little more problematic than the general procedure I outlined above. You may run into these:
- Art Books.
- Coffee table books.
- Books with a lot of pictures.
- This type of book relies on a particular type of clay-impregnated paper to print the sharp, clean colors of the pictures. The problem comes when this paper gets wet. The clay leeches to the
surface of the paper, and if the book even begins to dry, the clay will bond to itself and form a solid, irrecoverable block out of the book. Therefore, it becomes even more imperative than usual
that the book be frozen before it has a chance to dry. Once it’s frozen, you can proceed as usual, although you will probably have to exercise some caution in turning the pages as you dry them.
Have a sharp knife handy to open any edges that may have bonded.