Bold/Italic issues could be several pre-press issues: older format of PDF export, or Post Script production. Could be the bold/italic weights/variants were not an actual font file, and just mechanically created (with forced slant and outlines)... seen it all!
I recently went to a bookstore and saw a reprint of Improvisation by Derek Bailey – done by Da Capo books. A horrible reprint! The worst paper ever, lots of blurry text, overprint, faded text.
To me, everything related to Hachette books seems very iffy.
― fpsa, Tuesday, 19 March 2024 13:35 (three months ago) link